Dyslexilimerance
by Beldam
Summary: Unexpected pregnancy, reluctant friendship, and crazy happenstance for all! All in the life of our favourite, green, muscle pumping alien.
1. Chapter 1

A friend of mine who is an avid writer of lion king ffs commissioned this from me. (hah! Yeah right. Like any of my bum friends would pay me crack) Anywho, if you're an avid DB fan and you were let down by the recent DB movie, you're not alone. The friend in question has dubbed the movie the 'rape of piccolo', like one of those sixth century roman paintings of europa an what not. And so, I come to right the wrongs of the movie and return to his form self. Or at the very least rape him eloquently (no, I wouldn't do that)

I do not own DBZ, but maybe you would have been tipped off about that by the fact that this is a _fan_ fic.

Enjoy

* * *

Piccolo had thought he was healthy. He'd seen himself in the lake's reflection. His large, powerful muscles pumped and strained just as they should have, allowing him to be strong but graceful, and his teeth, long and sharp like polished daggers looked good and clean. His antennae hadn't shriveled up like the last time he had had a cold. They still sat safely on his forehead, 'sproinging' whenever he moved. His face hadn't grown tired and weary--it was still hard and stoic, and, from what occasional rambles he'd caught from the human women before he stopped caring, dashing as hell. He hadn't grown hair anywhere, god forbid, and his skin still had a soft, cool sheen to it, like smooth jade.

Everything had been perfectly normal the day before. He had woken early after a restless night, trained alone in the woods, and then meditated silently over the waterfall. He'd closed his eyes in the solitude of his cave, his cave where no one, especially not birds or reptiles ever went, and at some point he'd fallen asleep.

So he had no idea what the circumstances had been for him to wake up with this…this egg sitting next to him because he sure as hell didn't remember laying anything the night before. He stared at it, and had been staring at it, for a very long time. Perhaps he hoped the sheer hate and fury he concentrated in his glare would cause it to crack and fry right there on the floor of his once sacred cave. But nothing happened. It just sat there, mocking him with its perfection.

Piccolo had never been good with kids. Ever. He'd dealt with the many generations of the Saiyans for much too long. He'd grown long weary of annoying little children poking fun at the colour of his skin, which he thought was perfectly nice—you wouldn't tell a blade of grass to turn pink, would you?—and he certainly didn't like the way they pulled at his antennae or tried to understand what the pink blotches on his skin were for. If it wasn't for the fact that dealing them wasn't simply a formality, he would have murdered them ages ago. But this was different. This was his goddamned monster. So what the hell was he supposed to do with the thing?

He gritted his teeth. He needed to talk to someone about this. Kami and Nail were staying frustratingly mute when usually they enjoyed putting their two cents in places they sure didn't belong; they were probably snickering to themselves about this. Then should he have gone to Dende? It was unscrupulous to get him involved in this, though! He was God, for goodness' sake. It wasn't like he'd be interested in this madness. Besides, he'd probably laugh. If it had been anyone other than himself, like Vegeta or someone else Piccolo could have done well without, the Namek might have laughed too.

Piccolo finally decided he was being foolish and that he needed to resolve this as quickly as possible. He gave the smooth, shiny surface of that _thing_ one last look, and then resolved to pick it up not-so-carefully with the long, claw-like nails of his hands.

The egg could have fit an ostrich egg and a good number of chicken eggs in it—how he could have incubated and then coughed up such a monstrosity without noticing it baffled and revolted him. He was glad he hadn't been wake through it.

He stood up and held the egg awkwardly at arms length, and he realized quickly that this wasn't going to work. He couldn't fly to the look-out like this could he? It would be…straining. The optimal position would be to hold it to his chest, but that would be—and he shuddered at the thought—too motherly. At the very mention of the word his mind soared to thoughts of that harpy of a woman Goku had married. Perhaps it was _her _egg. It certainly seemed like a little hell bringer.

He folded his arms around it reluctantly, his lip tightening in a grimace when he registered that it was warm, and then it twitched. He jumped in surprise and dropped the thing, and then, for some crooked reason, he panicked. He dove to the ground faster than he knew he could and fumbled with it, and then with a sigh of relief, was holding it again safely in his arms. That's when he froze.

_What the _hell_?_

Had he just saved that godblessed thing? He'd saved the gremlin to be. He could have dropped it. It would have been an accident. He could have been having scrambled eggs for breakfast. But noooo! He had to get all 'maternal' and crap and save the bastard. He needed to get this thing out of his life now while he stilled had left some vestiges of his sanity. He had to.

He snarled at it in warning—if it shuddered like that again while he was in the air, that was it. Some lucky hobo would be eating green eggs for the next week.

He took in a breath, and then took off into the blue sky, trying not to think about the monster in his arms. His long, pointed ears twitched in accordance to the sound his cape made as it billowed behind him and the wind rushing past his aerodynamic form. He didn't occupy himself with anything but those things because if did think about anything else he might do something he…regretted? No, wrong word. He might do something he 'would enjoy severely causing him to relapse into a state of mild psychotics'. That sounded right.

He touched down soundlessly on the lookout point, obsidian eyes moving slowly along the pale pillars and floor. To an outside observer, he might have appeared very patient, but in reality, that would have been absolute crap. If that kid didn't show up within five seconds, someone was gonna die, and it wasn't going to be pretty. He was about two seconds from blowing a gasket when Dende appeared from inside the lookout-house, with a confused expression on his face.

That pissed Piccolo off more than anyone could ever know.

"Piccolo?" He said, his childlike voice soft and innocent and the large Namek cringed when he realized that thing in that egg might sound like that someday. If he didn't kill it. "What are you doing here today? You didn't say you were coming. Did something happen?" Dende paused when Piccolo's lip twitched, and then he took a few seconds to take in his counterpart's whole appearance.

_Yes, Dende, those are my feet. Yes, Dende, those are my kneecaps, thank you for noticing. Oh, yes, my obi? I changed it from red to blue—do you like it? Yes, it is fascinating, I can understand why you've been staring at it for the last three minutes. Yes, my collar is low enough to see my pecs. You're so wise! What? The egg in my arm? Gee whiz, where the heck did that come from? Oh well. It's not _nearly_ as interesting as my obi, eh? How 'bout you go look at that again? You know, waste a few more of my precious seconds. No. It'll be fun. Really. No? You think the egg is more interesting? Why, thank you so much ,Dende, for understanding! This is why _you're _God! _

The small Namek stared at the egg for a long time, maybe as long as Piccolo had that morning when he'd woken up next to it, and then he lifted his finger and pointed at it. "What is that?"

"I'll give you three guesses," Piccolo replied darkly.

Dende blinked thrice, Piccolo counted. "Oh…you mean…," He stuttered, and then grinned, "Congratulations!"

"Don't congratulate me!" Piccolo shrieked, shaking the lookout with his sheer decibal count, "It's an egg, Dende! I coughed up an _egg_! Why aren't you bothered by that!?"

"You're not happy?" Replied the young kami in confusion.

Piccolo squelched the urge to kill the boy because that would be wrong. He took in a deep breath to cool his nerves, swallowed, and then looked at Dende as calmly as he could.

"What the hell should I do with it?" He murmured.

Dende shrugged. "Raise it. It is your baby, after all."

"Don't call it my baby. It's an egg."

"Well…it would be your baby."

"Do you think anyone would miss it if I killed it?"

"Miss what, green bean?"

The namekians turned to their sides to see who had spoken, and Piccolo's face fell like a duck at hunting season.

"Oh, have all the demons of hades come to torment me?" He groaned at the saiyan, and he would continue to believe that it was self proclaimed, 'prince'. Vegeta had his eyebrow raised, hands in his pockets, as he walked with frustrating nonchalance up to the two other aliens.

"Vegeta, what wonderful--,"

"Horrible,"

"_Wonderful_ timing," Said Dende, ignoring the black aura looming about Piccolo, "Did you come to get that thing Bulma asked for?"

"I'm not her errand boy,' Vegeta said gruffly, more towards Piccolo than Dende, as though Piccolo cared about other people's family problems, "She was just being a pain in the ass today so I decided I'd take care of it to get her off my back,"

"Of course, Vegeta," Dende chirped, then put his hand in his pocket before quickly pulling out a small, square white envelope, "I hope she enjoys it,"

"Nnhnn." Vegeta grumbled in reply and stuffed it unceremoniously into his pocket.

Piccolo didn't like how he and his plight were suddenly being ignored for what might aswell have been a drug exchange.

"What was _that_?" Piccolo demanded.

"It's none of your business, green bean," Vegeta snarled back.

"You call me green bean again and you're going to have a black eye," The namekian hissed, quickly losing his cool.

"Yeah? How about a pair of blue nuts?"

"Both of you calm down!" Dende said, holding up his arms for them to cease, "Vegeta, thank you for being so quick to pick those up, but could you please leave now? He and I have some things to work out, if that's okay."

The saiyan's face scrunched up for a moment. He clearly didn't like the idea of being kicked off the island by Dende, but then he grumbled and shook his head.

"Whatever," he muttered, "This place is a dump, anyway. See ya, sprout."

"Good riddance…" Piccolo sighed. He shouldn't have. God, he shouldn't have. Because if he hadn't, Vegeta wouldn't have turned around, and he wouldn't have walked right up to the namek, and he wouldn't have tried to jab him in the chest, and his finger wouldn't have been thrown off course by the giant but apparently invisible-except-under-certain-circumstances egg. The prince was confused by the miraculous appearance of the large object for only a few moments. Then he took a few steps back, enough that he could hold his arms out at full length, and then he pointed at Piccolo and bust a gut laughing.

The namekian gritted his teeth in rage while Vegeta basically killed himself laughing like a loon, and just when Piccolo thought he'd exhausted himself, he hadn't.

"Ha!" Vegeta guffawed, "You were pregnant! What a woman!"

"I will bash your head in, Vegeta, I swear it!" Piccolo warned, rapidly reaching his tipping point.

"You really think you could while holding your bundle of joy?" The saiyan jeered.

"Alright, Vegeta. I'm in a desperate place right now," Said Piccolo, gesturing as articulately as he could with one arm preoccupied, "so I'm sure even one of your feeble intellect could understand the fact that if pushed I will snap you like the two-foot-twig you are."

Vegeta snickered. Somehow he wasn't intimidated by Piccolo's soaring rhetoric.

"So," He purred maliciously, "who's the father?"

"Excuse me?"

"Well, you're clearly the mother, so the father must be someone else. Oh! It was Kakarott's brat, right?! Hah! Kakarott's woman's going to kill you!"

"Why, you…!"

"Enough, enough!" Dende cried, his small fists clenched by his sides, "Both of you, quiet!"

Both the namekian and the saiyan turned their heads instinctively to Dende, surprised by the uncharacteristic outburst. The young kami took in a deep breath, patted the thick tuft that circled his neck in order to calm down, then took the dead silence as an opportunity to make whatever points he meant to make.

"Piccolo," He said, addressing his fellow namekian calmly, "it's your egg, so do with it what you want. But" He added, "if you destroy it, I know that one day you'll regret your decision. And Vegeta," he said, turning to the prince, "can you promise us your silence until Piccolo feels its right to tell the others about this? Please. We would really appreciate it."

Vegeta's brows furrowed, and Piccolo could almost hear him saying 'hell no'. The Namekian stepped forward, and for a moment he felt his desperation reach his face—he didn't want to have to deal with this, let alone have anyone else try to deal with it with him. Surely Vegeta could understand?

The man paused before he began to speak, then looked down and ran his gloved hand through his bristly black hair

"Fine." He huffed, albeit with clear contempt, "But that's because I want to let this stew a little while, and then it'll really get fun." He sneered and turned away with a sarcastic wave, "Green brean, sprout, I hope your kid brings you a ton of happiness."

"Go to hell, Vegeta,"

The saiyan leapt off the edge of the look out, and then he was just a flash of white light in the distance and no longer a concern.

Piccolo let out a heavy sigh, but that migraine wasn't to go down without a fight.

He looked at Dende, who was a little violet in the face, and said all he could think of.

"So, what am I supposed to do?"


	2. Chapter 2

OC intro. Don't worry, though. Piccolo will still be the focus and the oc will only show up here and there. I do this only because despite the vast number of characters to choose from none of them have the certain character flair I need in order to make this work. In theory, I could have made it a canon male character, but let's not go into the science of that, okay?

By the by, if you didn't already realize, updates will be _slow_. Sorry, people. High school is not a good time to be doing this sort of stuff especially when I should be studying for exams. And writing an original story of my own. And holding down five jobs (no I don't hold down any jobs. That would be against child labour laws. Plus, I'm lazy—hence the staying at home for hours upon hours in a single position with my laptop in my lap. Wow, that sounds dirty.)

Oh, yeah, and thanks for the reviews! You guys give me reason to live!

I don't own dbz, people. Akira Toriyama's name is _still_ on all the pretty little books with pictures in them.

* * *

He wanted someone to ask him. It was true. He'd been asking himself for the last two hours over and over again as he sat staring at the wall in a daze with some woman in a drunken stupor leaned up next to him and trying to feel him up in her sleep every five seconds, so he thought that maybe if someone else asked it might somehow click.

Piccolo, he wanted someone to say with an inquisitive quirk of the eyebrow and a 45 degree tilt of the head, what the hellare you doing in prison?

Yes. It was tragic and pathetic and morbidly unfunny, but that was the fact of it. He was in jail. And some warped part of him told him it would be wrong to try and escape. And to kill the men who'd dragged him here. And to snap Vegeta's little neck for abandoning him. In fact, he opted not to blow that whole place down because he didn't want to have to be held responsible for the killing spree that was sure to follow.

He tapped his nail spasmodically against that godblessed thing that had gotten him into this mess in the first place. He didn't know why he'd thought for a second that it wouldn't be so bad to take care of the egg. It was an egg for god's sake. It didn't truly scream 'high maintenance'. And yet, the circumstances spoke for themselves.

Piccolo rolled his head to the side and stared at the ceiling, seeing as how the wall had gotten old and he had to move on to the next new thing in order to keep it fresh. He realized in the process of thinking it that he was beginning to lose his mind. Quickly and without mercy. The woman next to him opened her mouth to let out a gentle groan, which caused Piccolo to instinctively try to lean away in order to avoid the sudden cascade of au-de-liquor.

So, how did it happen? The imaginary person in Piccolo's head asked who was doing on the necessary computing for him to get through this situation. It was a good question, too. He played it and replayed it in his mind but no matter what he did it just wouldn't fit in the rapidly shrinking funnel of his sanity. But he would keep replaying it in his head until it made sense or he could blow someone up with a clear conscience. Whichever came first.

……………………………..

"Vegeta, it's me."

"Me who?"

"Don't play around with me, Vegeta. I'm serious."

"I'm serious too. And who is this 'Vegeta' you speak of? I don't think you have the right house."

Piccolo narrowed his eyes and gripped the door handle into Capsule corp. so tight it started to make a very dangerous sound that Vegeta may have wanted to take a lesson from. If he wasn't careful, that would very soon be the sound his spine would make.

The namekian was unsure what had made him think that Vegeta would act like an adult for half a second. It was as embarrassing as hell, but it couldn't be helped. He needed Vegeta for this. He hated himself for it, but considering how Vegeta was the only non-namekian who knew and he'd have to be crazy to go to Dende and sit through all that 'kootchy-kootchy-koo' bull, he was stuck very simply between a rock and an egg. When this rock was so conveniently placed within walking distance of the egg in question, Piccolo wasn't sure what was stopping him from grabbing the egg, smashing it against the wall, and then running like hell so he could watch as vultures ate up the yolk from afar.

He still had a hard time forgiving this monstrous thing that had decided to take a backwards trip up his intestinal tract, but that didn't stop him from worrying about it every second of every hour of every day, so much so that not only was he becoming increasingly paranoid of the cuckoo birds living in the trees around his waterfall (though they had always been perfectly civil towards him) but whenever he left the cave to meditate he found himself checking back on the egg where it sat in the back of the cave, wrapped up in one of his old capes, going over to it, picking it up, going outside, holding it in the air, examining it for cracks, and then very calmly taking it back to the back of the cave, wrapping it up, and then leaving only to repeat the ritual within the next fifteen minutes.

The madness had to stop and it had to stop now. All he needed were some of Trunks' old baby supplies, a basket here, a blanket there, and he might regain a little of the independence that he once had. Though somehow he still doubted it. In any case, the fact that he was at that very moment cradling the egg in his right arm proved that some form of action had to be taken.

"Vegeta, stop being so immature and let me in."

"Go home, you lunatic!" Vegeta cried, faking hysterics, and then made quite an impressive mimicry of a dial tone, "I'm calling the cops! I'm going to count to three…! One!"

"Vegeta, open the door!" Piccolo snarled and shoved his shoulder against the still closed door while Vegeta pushed very vehemently back on it from the other side, "You said you would cooperate!"

"We don't live here anymore, Namek!" The saiyan said, apparently having forgotten is previous threat already which served as confirmation that he was in fact an idiot, "Whatever you want to say, have it mailed to us!

"What are you talking about?! Vegeta--,"

"I'm warning you, green bean! Comply or you will be met with force!"

"Have you lost your mind, Vegeta?" Piccolo shrieked, ignorant to the people who started to run very quickly in the general direction of 'away from the screaming green man', "Let me in before I…!"

Vegeta shoved back on the door, knocking Piccolo away from it, but less because Piccolo was weak enough to be shoved back like that and more because the namek had an aversion to being squashed by two ton doors. It fell with a colossal groan like a while slowly beaching itself on a shore, and then it hit the ground with a thud that shook the ground around it. Piccolo and Vegeta stared at it, the saiyan prince still gripping onto the door handle on his side of the door, and then he snapped his head up and pointed to Piccolo as though that catastrophe was his fault.

"Idiot, look what you did!" He cried at the top of his lungs, "If the woman gives me a hard time it'll be all your fault, Namek!"

"Take responsibility for your own actions, imbecile!" Piccolo yelled over even him which was much more difficult than it would have seemed.

"Fine, fine!" Vegeta said, waving his hands at Piccolo angrily, "Since I can't make you leave without you destroying my building, then at least make yourself discreet, alright?"

"You mean, despite the twenty minutes of yelling at your front door?" Piccolo hissed.

"Shut up. What the hell do you want anyway?"

"Give me some of Trunks' old baby items." Vegeta only stared at him. He decided to try being polite. "Please."

"Go screw yourself."

"But Vegeta--,"

"If you can't do it yourself, there's one of the scantily-clad-women places humans go to in the city. They'll do it for you."

That's it. It was time for blackmail.

He didn't know what made him say it—the words just poured out like vomit. After looking back on the words at a later date, he was both proud and mortified at his brazenness, but the fact was what he'd said was still insane.

"Help me," He said, "or I'll tell Bulma you and I are having an affair."

Vegeta stared at him for a long time, waiting for the punchline. When none came his eyes just about popped out of his head and Piccolo gave him a morbid smile.

_Yeah, that's right. You're not the only insensitive tough ass in town—not anymore._

"You wouldn't." Vegeta hissed.

"I would."

"But…you'd be spreading a rumor about yourself too!"

Piccolo shrugged and his smile widened. "The wonderful thing is, I don't really care what people say behind my back."

"But you're a man!" Vegeta cried, searching desperately for a reason to avoid such a thing leaking out into the public, "I would never have relations with another man! Ever!"

"Let's be technical," The namekian replied as he pressed his fingers together in the air with a certain malevolent evil genius flare that reminded him of the glory days, "I'm not really a 'he' per se, being asexual and whatnot, so it would be understandable if you found yourself…" He put his fist by his mouth and cleared his throat, "attracted to me. And everyone knows you have issues with your height so perhaps you decided to live out your aspiration of growing half a foot through me. And not only that…" He smirked, "an affair would explain why you're so irritable towards Bulma all the time."

"No." Vegeta breathed, "Don't you dare. Don't you dare tell anyone that!"

"Or what?" Piccolo dared.

"Or…" The saiyan paused, searching for his trumpcard in the shallow pool of his knowledge of Piccolo Daimoa, and then he found it. He looked at Piccolo with an evil grin that spread from ear to ear. "or I'll spill the beans about you egg."

The poor, poor fool. He thought Piccolo hadn't prepared for such a thing.

"Then," Piccolo said with a nonchalance that made even him impressed, "I'll tell them it's your fault."

That did it. The prospect of people thinking he'd gotten another man pregnant did the trick down and out. Vegeta buckled like he'd been punched in the gut. He was still standing with his hands on his knees and gasping for breath when he looked up at Piccolo with rage burning in his obsidian eyes.

"You son of a…" He said with winded breath, "I'm sending you straight to hell, you know that?"

"Mhmm." Piccolo mumbled and stepped inside the house.

It was a few more seconds before Vegeta came up behind him, a spasmodic twitch going off in his eyebrow.

"So what do you want, you bastard?" He snarled.

"I told you already."

"Well, you can't have them."

Piccolo spun around, five seconds from dangling his threat over Vegeta's head again, but Vegeta managed to cut in before he got the chance.

"The woman won't let me near any of Trunks infant things. I don't even know where they are." He said in contempt, "You incinerate one 'first drawing' and you never hear the end of it. We'll have to go to down to…" He paused as though for dramatic effect, "The _mall_."

Piccolo jolted in horror. He'd never been to the mall, but he'd seen them, and that was bad enough. They were like anthills—big, jam-packed, and grotesque. He'd hoped to die without knowing the perils of one, but apparently he wouldn't be so lucky.

"You're joking."

"This isn't my joking face." Vegeta snarled.

"But I don't want to go to the mall with you," Piccolo complained and Vegeta made a face.

"Okay, well there's no way in hell I'm letting you stand next to me while looking like an over grown green bean. At least try to look normal."

"And you're the authority on normal?

"Shut up." Vegeta snapped, "We need to find you a new wardrobe. You can make your own stuff, can't you?"

"I need a general idea of what to make though," Piccolo said as though speaking to a child, "It's not as easy as pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Let me see some of yours."

"Like hell I'm letting you into my things."

"Well you're going to have to give me something to work with.

"Ugh, fine," Vegeta groaned then started walking down the hall. Piccolo followed on instinct though in his stomach he really didn't want to. They stopped at another one of those monstrous door where the sound of a drill thrummed from inside, and then it stopped when Vegeta pounded his fist against the thick metal.

"Woman, stop whatever it is your doing! I need your services."

"Vegeta, I'm working!" Bulma's voice cried shrilly through the walls, "Go inflate a doll or something!"

Piccolo snorted when Vegeta's cheeks flared red.

"Not for that, you idiotic woman!" The saiyan prince cried, "Do you have any men's clothes!?"

"Stop being a pest! Go away!"

"Just tell me, damn it!"

The sigh Bulma let out was so exaggerated it came easily through the foot thick walls.

"There might be some of Yamcha's clothes in the guest bedroom," She said, "Go check."

"Why do you still have that bastards clothes!?"

"I'm having an affair! What do you think, Vegeta? They're just there, alright!"

"Woman, so help me I'll--,"

The sound of the drill screeching against metal caused Vegeta to recoil, and then he stared at the door with sheer hatred. Piccolo made a mental note to come back one day and ask Bulma for a few tips. Her technique was superb.

The saiyan huffed in a way that made it clear that he mistakenly thought that anyone gave a damn, and then he spun on his heel and started to stomp away.

"Nice to see who wears the pants in your family." Piccolo said.

"Shut up."

The door they stopped at this time actually looked like one that belonged in a house. It had a knob and was made of wood and creaked when you opened it. It was nice to see that not everything had succumbed to the metal age.

Vegeta pointed to the side of the room where a cabinet was built into the wall.

"They're probably in there."

"I realize that," Piccolo said sarcastically.

Vegeta rolled his eyes and just before he closed the door he said one more thing with a thin veil of darkness cloaking his aura.

"Green bean,"

"What?"

"…when you're done with them, burn them. Burn them twice if you can."

Piccolo raised the ridge of his eye at the saiyan as he closed the door with an eerie slowness. The egg in his arm trembled.

"You're better off just staying in there." Piccolo murmured to it and put it on the large bed on the other side of the room, carefully arranging pillows around it so it didn't roll off the bed.

He opened the cabinet and without thinking about it pulled out a black button down shirt and a pair of jeans. He held them in front of him, and while they paled when compared to the majesty of his bright purple ghee, he supposed the fact that they didn't clash with his skin made them a wearable option. He laid them out on the floor, judging how much smaller than him they were and compensating in his mind, then he held out his hands and a near identical pair appeared over his arms except these were tailored to fit.

He pulled off his turban and then the rest of his clothes, the weighted armor of his cape making a loud 'clunk' sound when it hit the ground, and then he pulled on the new clothes.

The fabric felt bizarre, but it wasn't as bad as he'd thought it would be. Next, shoes. He got on his knees and shifted through the bottom of the cabinet where a neat row of them sat waiting.

Sneakers? No. Sandals? No. Pumps? What the hell? Definite no. He settled on a pair of black oxford wing tips shoved in the very back row. He made a pair of his own, then pulled them on quickly. There, done and done. He looked at himself in the full body mirror and ended up smiling. Admittedly, it wasn't that bad. Not as good as a purple ghee, but not bad at all. In fact, this would work quite nicely for the time being.

He picked up his cape and without thinking he ripped a long, thick piece off of it, then tied it over his shoulder like a sling before taking the egg and putting it inside. There. That worked perfectly.

He left the room and walked right into Vegeta's loathing glare. Had he just been standing at the door looking at it the whole time? What had he been trying to do, burn it down with his eyes?

Was he a bigger idiot than Piccolo had thought?

"Took you long enough," Vegeta grumbled, "Can we just get this over with already?"

"Yes, I'm sure I'm detracting from your busy schedule. I know—heads to beat, brain cells to kill."

Vegeta flipped him off and started walking back to the still gaping entrance to the capsule corp. He stopped suddenly in front of the arched entrance between the kitchen and the sitting room when he seemed to be struck by a revelation, though Piccolo doubted he had the capacity for one, and he turned to the namekian with narrowed eyes.

"Do you have money?" He asked.

Piccolo looked at him like the absurd person he was. "Of course I don't have money, you imbecile."

"Oh, right," The saiyan muttered, "You're a hobo."

Piccolo bristeled—this coming from a person who sponged off his wife like a spoiled two year old?

"Pardon me, but do _you_ have money?" Piccolo challenged, and Vegeta twitched. They stood in silence for all of five seconds, pondering what they were going to do considering both of them were flat broke. Just then Bulma came into the kitchen. Her hair was tied into a messy ponytail and her face and hand were stained with dirt and oil. She threw her gloves off on the kitchen table along with the jacket she'd tied around her waist, then went to the fridge and pulled it open.

She ignored them where they stood staring at her—apparently it didn't register that Piccolo standing in her house with an egg slung over his shoulder was at all odd. Piccolo didn't question the science behind the amazing cloaking powers the egg gave him. He also had no idea why he was staring at this woman but Vegeta had started it and it was his wife so he decided to follow the man's lead. He stopped that when Vegeta crept up behind Bulma, and then with no warning at all he drove his hand into her pocket and ran for the hills.

"Woman, I'm taking your wallet!" He screamed when Bulma lunged for him, her face contorted into a mass of fury.

"Vegeta, you--,"

"Run, green bean, run!" The saiyan cried to Piccolo who'd been completely lost, but when Bulma started brandishing a wrench from her utility belt he got the idea. He took off after Vegeta through the destroyed front door (which Bulma reached with an infuriated banshee shriek) and then he and the saiyan simultaneously took off into the sky, but apparently not fast enough to avoid the wrench that soared through the air and cracked Vegeta against the skull.

The prince veered, jolted, and dipped, but managed to keep aloft and stay on a straight course away while his wife screamed bloody murder.

Neither said anything for a long time. Piccolo stole a sideways glance at Vegeta and noted the thin line of blood that trickled over the side of his disgruntled face.

"Doesn't that hurt?"

"Go to hell."

They reached the mall in only a few minutes time and touched down soundlessly on the asphalt in front of it. They were oblivious to the people who stared at the two men, one with hair that openly defied the laws of physics and the other with bright green skin, who had just come, literally, out of the blue with absolute dismay. What they thought wasn't important anyway.

The two of them walked inside and then they were suddenly overwhelmed by the noise and the smell and the cold of the mall.

What the hell had Piccolo been thinking?

"I'm going home." The Namekian announced, spinning on his heel. He gritted his teeth when Vegeta's hand ripped forward and grabbed him by his ear. The namekian yelped as he was yanked down to Vegeta's level, which appeared to be pretty damn low, and forced to stare into his pitch black eyes.

"Like hell you are," The saiyan snarled into Piccolo's face, "I didn't get hit in the head with a wrench for nothing. Now come on!"

"That hurts, you--," Piccolo tried to say but Vegeta just yanked at him again and his voice trailed into a whimper. Alright, so the little man had won.

This time.

Vegeta dragged him around several floors, and Piccolo decided not to advise him to actually look at one of the many, many directories that littered their path so conveniently. After what must have been half an hour, Vegeta finally freed Piccolo from his grasp, and the namekian shot back up and slapped the saiyan on the side of the head. He hadn't anticipated agitating Vegeta's finally clotted wound, but it couldn't be helped. God punished those that treated Piccolo like a dog.

"What the hell was that for?!" Vegeta cried, gushing blood again and it was a thing of beauty.

"Never grab my ear again!" Piccolo snarled back, "There's a good reason its attached to my head."

"Go to hell! I was helping you! Say thank you!"

"Just how were you helping me!?"

Vegeta's finger shot out to the shop in front of them, and then Piccolo was confronted with the overwhelming image of a shop that seemed to have been overrun with baby items of all sort, from beds to baby bottles and everything in between, it was like the baby god had regurgitated into a single store. Which was very much possible, Piccolo realized in retrospect.

The namekian was momentarily mesmerized by the store and then he turned to Vegeta with a blank expression on his face.

"I'm sorry for making your head bleed."

"Screw you." Vegeta snarled, pressing his gloved hand against his open wound and stomping inside the store with Piccolo in tow.

Admittedly, things went very smoothly. They didn't argue much, except when Vegeta, with a wild grin on his face, held up a peculiar device titled the 'Milk-o-Matic' and suggested Piccolo hook it up to one of man's more unsavory body parts, resulting in a thirty minute sprint where Piccolo chased the saiyan around the store threatening to kill him with a pacifier, and nothing of any real mention happened except for one woman coming up to Piccolo and asking if he'd perform at a children's birthday party which he politely, and outright, refused, with the saiyan chuckling in the background while he picked out a baby blanket.

After that, Vegeta just twiddled his thumbs while Piccolo did the main shopping around the place and in the end he settled on a hot water bottle that was shaped like an elephant, a woven baby basket with heavily embroidered baby basket in which the egg would from then on be sleeping, a strange puppy shaped object that played music when you pulled its tail (though Piccolo was in slight opposition to buying this as he didn't want his or any child to believe that if you went up to a dog and yanked its tail music would come out. He had experience in this area and that was _not _what happened) a baby bag, and the blue baby blanket Vegeta had picked for unknown reasons.

Things had gone so smoothly in fact that the idea that anything would go awry between there and the checkout counter seemed almost laughable.

The line for the cashier was rather long, hence the reason Vegeta had been standing next to Piccolo and grumbling all sorts of unsavory things for the last ten minutes, much to everyone in the line's chagrin. Piccolo occupied himself by thinking of all the ways that Vegeta leapt to new heights of idiocy.

"Hey, mister," Piccolo blinked and turned around to see a small, blond haired boy with big hazel eyes standing behind him with his arm hooked around his apparently preoccupied mother. The boy pointed to Piccolo's egg, which was still safely hung in the makeshift sling, and asked the obvious. "Is that an egg?"

"Yes," Said Piccolo, looking ahead of him again, "It is."

"Can I hold it?" The boy asked.

"No."

"It's pretty."

"If you say so."

"I like eggs, you know?"

"Do you, now." Piccolo said, his interest in the child plummeting further and further into nothingness.

"Yeah!" Said the boy with a grin, "They're so pretty. I collect them. There are white ones and brown ones and blue ones and eggs with spots on them and—"

"I get the point." The namekian said before the boy's speech got out of hand.

"Yeah," The kid said with a blissful smile on his face, "Eggs are the bomb."

"What?" The boy's mother snapped back to attention and then they focused on Piccolo's egg with a jolt. She snapped back on her child, her face contorted in sheer dismay, then threw out her finger and shrieked at the top of her lungs, "The egg! It's a bomb!"

"A bomb? Where!?" Someone further in the line hollered followed by someone else screaming, "Call the police! Hurry!"

"What?!" Piccolo cried and put up his hands and waved them in front of him in an attempt to calm the madness, "No, it isn't a bomb! It's an actual egg!"

"You're on your own, Namek." Vegeta said from the corner of his lip as he slunk off inconspicuously to the side.

"Vegeta, get back here you--!" And that's when he blacked out as a woman tazered him in the back.

…………………………………………….

Piccolo leaned his head against the wall in his cell and let out a resigned gurgle. Of course. It was the _boy_ that had caused all this turmoil. He was a fool to think for a moment children could be trusted. It had been a foolish sentiment and from here on out he would learn for such idiotic mistakes.

"Never hatch," He commanded his egg and it trembled gently in his arms as though to say 'good luck with that'.

The woman next to him let out a loud snort and then she rolled off the bench and hit the floor with a loud 'slap'. She writhed about for a few seconds like a worm then she lifted her head and looked around her with hazy chestnut eyes.

"Where am I?" She gurgled a line of saliva shining on her chin.

"Prison." Piccolo answered.

"Aw, man, again…?" She grumbled, wiping the saliva from her face with the black sleeve of her oversized sweater, part of it slipping down her shoulders to reveal, to Piccolo's horror, her bra strap. She staggered to her feet and collapsed against the cell bars. "Hey, hey, Alphie," She called to the prison guard who was sitting at a desk two or three meters away and Piccolo found it worrisome that she had come to know the police by name, "what am I in for this time?"

"Prostitution." Alphie answered, turning a page of his newspaper and taking a sip of his coffee.

"What? Oh, come on! That's not fair." The woman cried, "I'm a good girl, I swear! You know I was under the influence! I demand a retrial!"

"Whatever. Just don't puke on the floor like last time. It took us a week to wash out the smell the first time."

The woman stuck out her tongue and stumbled back over to the bench and collapsed next to Piccolo.

"So, uh…" She said, her head tilted on her shoulder so her short black hair crumpled on her shirt, "What are you in for, green?"

"That's none of your business," Piccolo snarled. He refused to divulge the reason for his ending up in this disgraceful to anyone let alone this…woman. She stared at him for a long time and then snapped her head to the iron bars.

"Alphie!"

"Bomb threat," The guard said, turning to reveal the black eye Piccolo had given him when he tried to crack open the egg to see if the ticking came from inside it or it did in fact come from his wrist watch, "It turned out to be a false alarm, but I mean…look at him." He said, waving at Piccolo's very green complexion," We're keeping him for observation, just in case."

"A semi-terrorist, huh?" the woman said, her speech slurred, and looked at Piccolo, her head tilting to the side, "Couldn't make the big time, huh, green?"

"My name isn't green," Piccolo growled at her, "It's Piccolo,"

"Pleased to meet you, Piccolo," The woman said with a disorientated smile. "My name's…Dolly, I'm pretty sure."

"You're pretty sure?" The namekian said incredulously.

"I can't hear my thoughts over this headache…oh, God, I feel like crap."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"If I throw up, just move to the left, okay? You'll be able to miss most of the bile."

"Can I get a new cellmate!?" Piccolo cried to Alphie who just chuckled lightly and said nothing.

That bastard was the first one to die when Piccolo got out.

"Can I at least get another call?" He pleaded, not wanting to be stuck here for a second more with this severely hung over woman.

"How long have you been here?"

"Over two hours."

"Huh…alright, I guess it's okay. But leave the egg in the--,"

Piccolo let out a low growl and the guard put up his hands in surrender. He came and unlocked the gate and Piccolo stepped out, giving the man the evil eye all the way to the telephone on the other side of the room. He didn't know how or why he had dedicated the number to memory, but he had, and for the second time that day he picked up the phone and called Vegeta. He would have called Gohan, but that posed the risk of the harpy woman picking up and then slamming the phone down on him before he got a word in edgewise. Vegeta was his only option.

The phone rang three times before Vegeta finally picked up.

"Who is this?" The saiyan said beneath his breath, "Hang up. I don't have time for this."

"Vegeta, it's Piccolo." The namekian said, "Come get me out of here this instant or I swear I'll--,"

"You don't get it. I can't talk to you right now. I'm serious." There was a monstrous shriek in the background, and the sound of a door being knocked down, "Green bean, got to go! Bye!"

"At least call Go--,"

And then there was just the dial tone again. Piccolo stared at the mute receiver, waiting, waiting for this to be some kind of joke, but he had no such luck and as his rage built he crushed the receiver in his fist.

Son of a _bitch_!

"Whoa, okay, back in the cell!" The guard said, his expression horrified and he shoved Piccolo back into the holding cell before the namekian could get his bearings. He was just…stunned with rage. How could Vegeta abandon him like that? Was this funny? Was this a joke? Did he think this was some sort of joke?!

He kicked his foot clear through the wall and let out an enraged shriek which caused Dolly to duck her head down.

"Stop yelling, please!" She said, her voice having a strange sound that Piccolo didn't like, "I'll throw up!"

"Fine, throw up, I don't care!" Piccolo shrieked, kicking his foot into the wall over and over much to the horror of the man outside the cell, "I can't believe this! How could he—argh!"

"If you're worried about bail, I'll convince the person who usually gets me out to do the same for you! Alphie always calls him after I've been busted! He'll spring you too! I swear!"

Piccolo paused, then looked at Dolly who was quivering on the bench with her hands over her ears.

"Really?" He asked.

"Really, really," Dolly said gently.

Piccolo paused, then with an immense amount of awkwardness he sat down next to the woman with a sigh.

"Thank you."

"Yuh-huh," The woman murmured and carefully removed her hands from her ears, "You won't yell anymore."

"No. I think I got it all out."

"Okay," She said, carefully, and smiled, "Then we can talk out the rest of this miserable situation."

"That's an understatement," Piccolo grumbled and Dolly chuckled.

"It's not! I mean, if you didn't go to prison," She grinned, "then how would you meet interesting people like me, huh?"

"Under the worst of circumstances."

"Booh! What a mean guy! I bet woman don't date you because you have a bad attitude, not because you're green, even."

"Excuse me for that, then," Piccolo said sarcastically, "I'll keep that in mind in fut--,"

"Piccolo?"

The namekian blinked when a familiar voice said his name from behind him and he turned slowly, slowly to look into the pitch black eyes of his old student.

"Gohan?"

* * *

Duhn Duhn Duuuuhn!

They thought it would be about the emotional bond between a father and his egg, the growing threads between a man and his shorty. That's what they thought.

But they were wrong.

Okay, obviously, things will progress in a natural way but I'd be lying if I said I actually had any idea where this is going. But I'll try to keep this fun and upbeat as I can! Whoo hoo!

To be frank, I didn't particularly like the writing in this chapter, but it was so utterly absurd I couldn't help myself.

Oh, and if you're wondering about who the kid is, I think he may be evil incarnate.

The niche has been _filled_.


	3. Chapter 3

Piccolo froze like a popsicle stick in Antarctica as he stared back into Gohan's equally petrified dark eyes. Why was Gohan surprised? Why wasn't he saying 'Vegeta called me and I've come to bail you out'? Why the hell was he just freaking staring?

Did he honestly not know why Piccolo was in jail?

Piccolo had the sudden urge to commit suicide. A nice, permanent, painful thing so he wouldn't have to get through this alive. And if he didn't manage to untie his shoelace fast enough to hang himself with it, then he would find a gun.

"Piccolo?" Gohan breathed. "What are you doing here? And what's that egg? Is it…yours…?"

What the hell? He'd noticed it? This egg which no one in the world could see unless prompted to by touching it or bomb threats, and Gohan had noticed it right of the bat. The last person he wanted to know he'd spontaneously coughed up a little bastard and he'd seen it.

The namekian started to panic before he could get a hold of himself. All he could think was that he needed to hide the evidence, but that stupid prison cell didn't have a thing in the ways of concealment. Which left him only one option. He raised the egg high above his head, fueled by adrenaline and embarrassment, and cried at the top of his lungs, "It's God's egg now!"

"Wait, Piccolo, we can work through this! Just calm down!"

It was moments like those--having an egg snatched from your arms and being shoved to the ground by someone who you'd mentored almost your entire life, inadvertently making you ram your head into a wall—that you realized things really were better with omelets and that phrases like those made the most sense when you'd been given a concussion.

………………………

The Namekian glared daggers at the half-saiyan sitting across him at the diner table, concentrating all the rage that he would have dispersed evenly among Gohan, passers by who just couldn't keep their comments to themselves, and the waiter who kept asking him what he wanted to eat even though he'd said twenty billion times that _just water was fine_, but not today. The fact that Piccolo was sitting there with an ice pack pressed to his skull because he'd been knocked out for the second time that day was enough to warrant at least an hours worth of unadulterated unforgiveness.

"Piccolo…" Gohan breathed, eyes on the table.

Piccolo scowled on reflex and Gohan sighed.

"Come on, Piccolo, talk to me." He looked up carefully to reveal his eyebrows were furrowed tightly together. "I'm sorry, okay? It was a mistake."

"That's no excuse," Piccolo hissed. "I've had a very bad day, Kid. I didn't need you of all people to make it worse."

"I know." Gohan looked down again, slowly, and his expression was resigned as though he knew there was no arguing. He curled his fingers together on the tabletop and bit his lip. He was looking for words to say. Obviously, by the way his mouth opened and closed silently, he couldn't find any.

As the Namekian watched him he felt his muscles tense. Why did Gohan have to be that way? He gritted his teeth when even his heart started to squeeze. Why did Piccolo have to be _this_ way?

"I wish you wouldn't do that," he growled.

"Do what…?" asked Gohan.

"Make me--" Piccolo cut himself off before he finished the sentence and looked away with a scowl. He couldn't finish it. He didn't want to say 'make me care.' He shook his head, and his anger left him. He'd never been good at staying angry at Gohan. "Forget it. Just forget everything. I don't have the patience for this type of idiocy anymore today."

There was a long silence between them. Gohan glanced nervously up at Piccolo, eyes silent with scrutiny. When a wide beam spread his lip it was obvious he'd read his old mentor as he always had—like a book.

"So…" Gohan breathed, stealing a glance at the egg held in Piccolo's left arm, "how did you get it?"

Piccolo snorted. Of course, he'd start with the egg. Not, 'how are you, Piccolo?' Or, 'sorry about your head, Piccolo' but 'The Egg'. People made him miserable sometimes.

"Dende told me it just happens at a certain point in a Namekian's life," he muttered. "It was bound to happen eventually. Why do you ask?

"No! No reason. I just wanted to know if you'd, you know," he blushed faintly and his voice became soft, "gotten together with someone."

Piccolo raised in eyebrow skeptically. "Who in their right mind would want to be together with me?"

Gohan smiled gently. "Yeah," he chuckled, shaking his head with a slowly disbelief. "Who in their right mind…"

Piccolo narrowed his eyes instinctively at Gohan's expression, something about it making him shiver. "Kid?" he said, eyes narrowed. When he got no response he leaned forward questioningly. "…Gohan?"

He jumped when someone slammed their hand down in between the two of them and then had the audacity to casually sit down next to them with a wide grin as though Piccolo hadn't been this close to blowing their head off. As soon as he saw the face he grimaced. Of course. It was The Woman.

"I'm back!" Dolly cried, her face aglow as she sat bouncily in her chair. Like a little five year old that wanted Piccolo to kill her. "Ya miss me?!"

"_No," _Piccolo snarled.

"C'mon, don't be mean," Gohan said.

"Asking the wrong person, Kid."

Gohan smiled.

"Fine, then," said the Namekian darkly when it was apparent the girl wasn't leaving. He was also mildly curious as to why Gohan was acquainted with the drunkard. "How do you two know each other?"

"Uh…" Gohan narrowed his eyes darkly. "long story."

"I'm his ex's drunkard friend," said Dolly cheerily.  
So even she knew it.

"Yeah…" Gohan muttered with obvious embarrassment. "I've kind of been bailing Dolly out of situations like these for a while now. It's sort of just habit. We go to the same college, so it's no big deal, but still."

The Namekian back tracked several sentences to the bit that bothered him.

"Your ex?" he repeated. He choked slightly on the grotesque nature of the next sentence, hating that such words had to come from his lips. "You had a…a…girlfriend before Videl?"

Gohan blinked twice in obvious confusion. He blinked a few more times all the while just staring at Piccolo, and after a little while the Namekian had the urge to explain to the kid that he didn't understand Morse code. "What are you talking about, Piccolo? You know Videl and I broke up ages ago."

Piccolo paused.

_Huh._

Idly, he took a sip of water. "You didn't tell me."

"What?" Gohan leaned suddenly over the table. "I must have!"

"No," Piccolo said sternly, simply. "You didn't. I would have remembered."

The half-saiyan's shoulders slumped when he realized his old mentor was being serious. Slowly, he leaned back in his chair, eyebrows furrowed as he stared off into nowhere. His hands sat in loose fists on the table.

"Oh…" he said distantly, then his eyes focused again. "I…didn't forget to tell you on purpose, Piccolo."

The Namekian sneered.

"You forget to do things on purpose?"

"No, that's not…" He sighed and Piccolo raised an eyebrow. "It's just embarrassing why we broke it off."

"You think you have problems," Piccolo scoffed. "I have to walk around cradling an egg, kid," he went on, gesturing to the offending object. "What do you think that makes me?"

"A good mother!" Dolly put in suddenly and Piccolo's eyes shot to her in disgust. He'd completely forgotten she was there—or maybe his mind had been trying to suppress the memory. Who knew?

Piccolo did. It was definitely the second one.

"Ugh," he groaned into her cheery face. "What are you still doing here?"

She just smiled and took his water. He ignored her from then on out.

"By the way, Piccolo, what are you going to name him when he hatches?" Gohan said with a sheepish smile—he was obviously embarrassed for the girl.

"Him?" Piccolo repeated.

"Well, it's going to be a boy." Gohan grinned, happy again. One wondered if he was bipolar with the way his moods changed. "What's the name going to be?"

Piccolo snorted. The problem with Gohan was this—he saw too much good in people. Always trying to reach out his hand, wanting to trust the untrustworthy…then again, it might have been only the Namekian he was like that with, but Piccolo doubted it. Still, he hoped for too much and didn't let the logic in until later. It wasn't Piccolo's fault that he always had to dash Gohan's hopes against the wall.

"I don't plan to keep it that long."

Gohan nearly shot out of his seat and Piccolo flinched away from the surge of energy that erupted from the boy. Maybe the hope-dashing game had become obsolete after Gohan had become more powerful than Piccolo. "What?! You're going to get rid of him!?"

"Gohan--"

"But…but…! No, you're just going through a little bit of postnatal stress is all." He said, forcing a smile, gripping Piccolo's shoulders across the table. The Namekian glared daggers until the boy let go of him. "This is your child we're talking about. Your child. I'm not…" he gulped, "I'm not going to let you get rid of it."

The two stared at each other, daring one another to be the first to look away. Piccolo was good at this game—it was one of those ones he very rarely lost. Nevertheless, under Gohan's adamant gaze, he decided it was a fight better off not winning.

"Fine," he said. "Be a stubborn idiot." He shook his head and snatched his drink back from Dolly. Dear Dende, he wanted to blow her head off when she started to whine. It was his drink for God's sake. How many brain cells had the liquor killed, anyway? He tried to ignore her wails to preserve the calm, steely look he was giving Gohan. It was very, very difficult. "Really, Gohan," he murmured. "You're as a bad as your father."

"Thanks," Gohan replied sincerely.

Piccolo just barely controlled a smile.

Naturally, being completely blind-sided by Dolly had been an utter surprise, so it was in his every defense if he accidentally murdered her like the pathetic little runt that she was.

"I'll kill you!"

"Please, just give it back! I'm thirsty!"

"Just get your own drink! Don't bite me you--!"

"Gohan, make him stop…!" she cried as she throttled Piccolo with surprising force where the two of them were on the floor. Piccolo gripped the egg tight in his arm, grimacing when he realized he couldn't swat her off and protect it at the same time, and grimacing even more when he realized that he _wanted_ to protect it.

On the sidelines, some people were crying for someone to call the cops. Something about a green man attempting to molest an innocent girl. He swore to God, someone in the table next to theirs stood up and _kicked him_.

I, he mouthed to Gohan.

Will

Ne-

-ver

For-

Give

You

Meanwhile Gohan called for the waiter.

Fifteen minutes later they'd outrun the cops and Dolly was passed out over Gohan's shoulder while they walked down the street. People might have said that it was because, say, Piccolo had accidentally knocked her with a smile on his face into the opposing wall and made her go unconscious, but who could really tell these things? It had been very crazy what with security running in and all. Dende would side with him on this one.

"She's still just a little tipsy," Gohan explained sheepishly. "She's a lot easier to control when she's sober."

"She's a menace," Piccolo said.

"Only when she's wasted. I'm telling you, you'll like her."

"No excuse."

Gohan snorted. He paused and eventually slowed to a stop. The sun car an orange light over him and gave his black eyes colour.

"I should be heading home," he said, looking at the dim sky. "I'll need to drop Dolly back at the dorm, too."

The Namekian grunted faintly and did little else. Gohan swallowed back either words or saliva. Piccolo didn't know.

"It was nice seeing you, Piccolo."

"Indeed," he murmured in reply.

Gohan only hesitated for a second, but that was really all it took.

Piccolo didn't stop it though he knew it was coming. It was really pointless at this stage. In a foreign, uncomfortable way he'd grown to…accept the boy's arms latched around him. At one time it had been his leg, at another stage it had been his waist. Now they went squarely around his ribs Strange how tall Gohan had become—it was an odd idea that they were almost standing on the same ground.

He said nothing for several seconds as the half-saiyan held him. His lips were pursed, and inside his mouth his teeth grated against his bottom one, bringing sweet blood onto his tongue. How long would it be? How many more years would it take for him to understand it, to get used to this human need for contact? It was not a Saiyan attribute, he knew that well enough from Vegeta's generally brisk manner. And if it was something Namekian, it certainly hadn't been Piccolo who taught it to Gohan. No, it was definitely human in origin. That was why Piccolo could never, ever hope to understand it. Could never be trained to return that embrace.

"Kid," he breathed. For a moment, the half-saiyan held him tighter as though he were trying to throw a silent tantrum. Like he was saying, 'I won't let you go.' But he did. On his own, in his own time. He knew better. Whatever it was he was looking for in Piccolo and had been looking for in him since they'd first met didn't exist. He'd have to learn that eventually.

"Sorry," Gohan rasped while letting go. He took a deep breath through his nose and positioned Dolly more carefully on his shoulder. He didn't make eye contact with his old mentor. "I couldn't…"

"You couldn't?" Piccolo prompted.

The boy furrowed his brows.

"I couldn't help myself."

Again, nothing. No words. Piccolo hated it, but the simple fact was that he had nothing to say.

"I'll see you guys around," said Gohan with a half smile. Piccolo was a mere second away from correcting the use of plural, but he realized too soon that the half-saiyan was referring to the egg as well. Piccolo grimaced.

"Likewise, I'm sure," he answered, gruff as ever.

Gohan's lip turned up at the other end and then the smile was all there, though this time it was lacking in sincerity.

"Goodbye," he said.

"Goodbye," Piccolo replied.

He didn't wait for the boy to turn away before he was taking off into the air, making streaks across the dark sky. At first, he wanted to go back to the safety and solitude of the forest, of the depths of the meadow hidden inside it. When the egg shivered, he reconsidered for a moment before flying off towards the city. He landed silently on the Capsule Corp. building and slid deftly down its curved side until he reached a balcony. Without disturbing anything he slid the door open and stepped gently inside. He didn't make a sound. He'd taught himself silence years ago, both in actions and in words. He crept down the halls, keeping his energy signature humanly low so no one took any notice of him, and stalked down towards the gravity room. He was only mildly surprised to find Vegeta was nowhere near it, but it certainly saved him a lot of trouble of thinking up a plausible excuse. He went to the controls and observed them quietly, his thumb and forefinger pinching his chin. He wonder momentarily what Gohan would say about this, but in the end he realized he didn't give a damn and with one of the smiles that seldom twisted his lip he blew the thing to smithereens. Dear Dende, he missed the days of unadulterated destruction. Times like this made it feel so damn good. He was long gone by the time his sensitive ears picked up a shriek of horror behind him and he sneered in silent appreciation for the little things. He would pick up the supplies they'd gathered from Vegeta later. Perhaps when he'd gotten over the room.

Gently, he touched down in his cave, secluded in the dark forest, and laid the egg carefully down in his—he flinched—_its_ basket. He sighed, both irritated and relieved that the day was finally ending, and stretched his arms above his head. He stripped from the clothes he'd been lent and for a moment let the cool air prick his skin before materializing new clothes and pulling them onto himself slowly. He did nothing for a moment, just closing his eyes and breathing. It was almost like sleep, though it lacked the comfort of absolute nothing that unconsciousness had.

He left the cave and flew to his waterfall, at which point he folded his legs, put his hands on his thighs, and closed his eyes to the world. He thought for a moment of Gohan, realizing silently that it had been quite a while since they'd seen each other last. It made his insides ache so he tried to think of something else, but all that did was force the image of The Woman pop up, and when he nearly choked upon the thought he realized he needed to reroute his thinking patterns seriously.

In the end, he began meditating on the contenting picture of what Vegeta's face would look like when he saw the gravity room.

* * *

Holy Jesus, it's an update! The apocalypse is nigh!

Thanks again for the comments! When I said you gave me reason to live, it wasn't a lie! I love you all!

To be frank, I've never pegged myself as a comedy writer, but there you go. I've surprised myself. Anyway, this isn't about me, it's about the story. I'm so sorry this took such a long time. And I know it took a damn long time. Again, please forgive me.

Funnily, I seem to write best during exams. Perhaps knowing I'm doing a good days slacking is good for me.

Anyway, so the plot thickens. I'd be lying if I said I had a clue about where the hell this is going, (did I say this before?) but I promise to make it interesting. We're nearing my forte, which is great.


	4. Chapter 4

"What are we doing here, Greenbean?" Vegeta grumbled, kicking up some rocks in the courtyard lackadaisically. "I have shit to do that involves me not being here."

"_You're_ here to apologize to Gohan for that fiasco yesterday," Piccolo muttered in return and took the man stares boring into his side in stride, despite the fact that he'd even gone out of his way to change into civilian clothing to blend in. He did throw out the occasional energy ball, just to be fair, but who really cared? Students could use the adrenaline.

Piccolo had stopped at the harpy's house and sat through her screaming for ten straight minutes before she noticed the egg in Piccolo's sling. At about that time she seemed to think they'd become kindred spirits and informed him of where Gohan was. Apparently he'd gone to some dorm at his campus, and that just so happened to be here, so that was where Piccolo was going.

A part of him regretted forcing Vegeta to go along (it turned out that the whole dating thing still held water) but a larger part of him knew that this was going to make the saiyan suffer. And that's what made all the difference.

"Can we get this over with?" Vegeta said. "I have things to do."

"Do you, now?" Piccolo sneered and glanced at the saiyan from the corner of his eye. "Last I heard the gravity room was…in rather bad shape."

The saiyan for a moment looked like he was possess, what with his jaw dislocating and his mouth going twice its usual size and his eyes rolling back into his head, not to mention the little bit of foam that started to bubble at the corner of his lip, but he was back to his usual level of…God knew what in a matter of seconds. Though during the little bout his leg jerked a little and sent a stone flying into the opposite building. When people started to scream they knew it was time to run.

When the got to the dorm the harpy had told Piccolo was the one to go through they were both out of breath and Piccolo realized that there was no way he could ever make Vegeta suffer more than Vegeta made him suffer.

"What the hell was that?" said the saiyan. "Pathetic humans. Did you listen to their miserable little screams? I should go back there and teach them a lesson about strength."

"Says the person who vacated the scene of the crime."

"Silence!"

"Let's just get this over with," Piccolo sighed. He lifted his fist to knock on the door but his knuckles had just barely touched it when it opened on its own. So, either he was far stronger than even he could fathom or someone wasn't very safety conscious.

"Kid?"

No reply.

The saiyan and the Namekian exchanged glances before Vegeta decided to abandon ship.

"Well, I've done my community service," said Vegeta. "See you later, Green Bean."

"I do know the number of Capsule Corp. off by heart, you realize. And I imagine there is a phone somewhere in this dorm room."

"Yeah. So?"

"Do you really think you could get to your wife before the phone lines?"

In the end, Vegeta accompanied Piccolo inside while foaming at the mouth.

"Kakarrot's brat?" Vegeta said idly. He picked up a keychain on a dresser inside and started to fiddle with it. "Kakarrot's brat?"

Still nothing. Not even a peep.

"I'm done."

"What is wrong with you? Could you have a little patience?"

"Patience is for commoners."

"You would think you'd have a lot then."

"What?!"

Piccolo said nothing and moved on to the next room in the dorm. To be honest, he had no idea what Gohan would be doing in a place like this. While not overtly feminine, without little knowledge on the subject he could tell a woman lived here. If the stuffed animals littered on the couch weren't an overt enough indication he didn't know what was.

He stopped and looked around him, taking in every inch of his surroundings before drawing the most obvious conclusion.

"An affair?"

He spun around when he noticed a minute but human-level power signature behind him. He hadn't fully been expecting Dolly of all the godblessed people in the world to start pelting him with a teddy bear while wearing only a towel.

"It's a pervert!" she cried while sending water flying everywhere like a wet dog. "Squeal! Squeeel!"

"Would you stop—would you stop hitting me!?" he snarled while putting his arms up to keep the bear from hitting his face. Lo and behold, there God just _had_ to stick a stuffed animal in his path to fall on, didn't he? He was a real freaking comedian. Both Piccolo and Dolly toppled, her on top of him, and he grunted when her elbow nailed him in the stomach. She pushed herself up enough that she could look at him in horror, but it never really occurred to her, practically naked like she was, to _get the hell off of him_.

"Oh my God," she screamed. "Is that a boner?!"

"Don't be disgusting!" He hollered over her. "_Whatever_ it is, you're imagining it!"

"Prove it!"

"How do you expect me to—get your hands out of my pants!" He shrieked and yanked her hands away from him in sheer dismay. "Are you mad!? I cannot 'get a boner'! Is that understood?"

"Yeah?" she said, dubious. "How am I supposed to know you're not just trying to hide your perverted ways?"

"Who put their hands down who's pants?" he hissed.

"Answer me!" she cried, raising the bear in warning.

He could not believe he was being threatened with a bear.

"Trust me," he said as gently as he could. "I am not interested in such lasciviousness."

After a furtive eyeing, her arms dropped to her sides and she let the teddy bear fall from her hand.

"Ohhh," she breathed in the voice of someone who'd just made some great discovery. "You're impotent."

Piccolo flushed so hard that his cheeks went straight off the visible spectrum and into ultraviolet.

"I am not…! I'm…! Get off me!" he snapped and shoved her away. He pushed himself to his feet and dusted himself off, face caught in a grimace of disgust. "I should hand you back to Alphie…! Let him take you off the streets so you're no longer a danger to society."

"Don't worry about it!" Dolly grinned and leaned up against him. "I'm impotent too! Sort of. No wait, it's sterility…Doesn't matter! Point is, we're in the same boat! I'm here for you!"

"I don't want you anywhere near me," he snarled and then he got a whiff of the air around her. "And your breath smells of liquor! It's eleven o' clock! Don't you have any shame?!"

"Of course I have shame! I'm wearing a towel aren't I?!"

It didn't matter. He didn't care about the towel. He just snatched her wrist, dragged her to the kitchen and forced her to take a seat while he rummaged through her fridge. Beer, beer, liquor, eggs, milk. He took the eggs and the milk, tossed the eggs into a nearby blender and poured the milk in before setting it on high. A minute later he was shoving the thing in Dolly's face and demanding for her to drink.

"There are egg shells floating in it."

"I don't care! Just drink it."

"But I don't wann--" He grabbed her head and poured the concoction down her throat, not caring whether she wanted it or not. Between gulps she still managed to scream, "Rape! Rape!" over and over, so he knew that the whole damned thing was necessary in order to make her stop.

As soon as she was finished she passed out and collapsed against the floor with Piccolo standing over her and wondering if he'd done the right thing. While lifting her up and taking her to the couch to lie down he decided it was for the greater good. One more menace incapacitated for the sake of the world.

Ten minutes later she was coming to. This time she actually looked mildly coherent.

"Ugh…God. What time is it…?"

As coherent as you could be when you were as smashed as a car on the disaster channel. She noticed Piccolo sitting cross-legged in the armchair across her and after a few seconds seemed to register that he was not one of her stuffed animals.

"Uh, hi," she muttered. "Um…do I know you?"

"No," the Namek said and stood up. "You don't. At all. I just heard reports of a dead person in here and came to look into it." He paused. "Goodbye."

"No, I remember you," she said and you could hear in her voice she was slowly gaining more consciousness. "You're convict number 2, right? The one with the bomb. Piccolo."

"I am no convict!" Piccolo snapped. "And it was not a bomb! It was an egg and that child was the _devil_! I--"

"You don't have to explain to me," she laughed and sat up on the couch. "I believe you. So what do you need? You're Gohan's friend, right?"

"In a manner of speaking. I came here looking for him. The harp--" he cleared his throat and corrected himself. "His mother sent me here."

"Ah," said Dolly. "She doesn't like you much does she?

"Why do you say that?"

There was a long pause that kept lengthening until Dolly was staring at him emptily with dark eyes.

"We have the hospital on our speed dial."

"I see."

"Anyway, Gohan was here a little while ago. I remember opening the door for him…but after that…" She puckered her lips and stroked her chin. "I think there may have been crack involved.

"Excuse me?

"So what's your deal, huh?" she went on and crossed her arms. "You and Gohan seem pretty close."

"We're not," Piccolo said, though the twisting in his stomach all but forced him to acknowledge he was lying. "I was his mentor when he was a child. Things have changed."

"They don't seem to have changed to me." Dolly smiled. "I mean, you were carrying his child and all."

"No, no, things have definitely—" he all but sent himself hurtling across the room as soon as her sentence registered. "I was not carrying his child!"

"I'm just kidding!" she said and held up her hands in truce while Piccolo backed slowly away. "Gosh, Pic, what's with you anyway? Can I ask you something?"

"**No."**

"Where are you from anyway? You don't see many green, egg toting folks around here." She gestured to the egg where it was slung.

Piccolo let silence fill the room as he thought about the answer that would be the easiest for her to understand. In the end he decided on the simplest of them.

"Far away."

Her smile got wider.

"No kidding. Well, I'm jealous of you. I wish I could lay an egg."

"It was not laid." He paused to think about the sentence and added, "and neither was I!"

"Whatever," Dolly laughed. "It must be fun knowing you're going to be a daddy soon. Are you looking forward to it?"

"I'll never be anyone's father." He glanced down at the impossibly frustrating object. "The egg included. This is merely a burden and a setback."

"Yeah? Then why do you still have it?"

He narrowed his eyes, at first in thought, then decided it didn't matter anyway and direction a glare at the woman.

"My reasons are mine alone. You're in no position to question them."

"I know, I know. I was just thinking…" she sighed. "I'm a little jealous of you."

"Why would you be jealous of me?

She stared at him for a long, long moment, and when she smiled once again it was as though her lip was going to crack.

"No reason."

When she ducked her head he didn't know what he was expecting her to do. Perhaps he'd thought she was bowing her head in praise of him. Wouldn't that have been nice—for better that for her to take the opportunity of silence to start crying. Piccolo stared down in rapidly increasing horror as her volume increased with every second. By that point his antennae were standing straight up.

"What are you doing?!" he cried. "Don't cry! I…I have nothing to do with this…! I—" He grunted when she threw herself against him and kept on crying while she held onto him as though for dear life. He grimaced away from her hold as she sobbed into his chest, disliking her warmth or the feel her tears had against his skin. Nonetheless, he knew he had to do something, because you _always _had to do something. He'd had to force negligence with Gohan, he'd been all but forced to with that idiot Goten, and somehow he'd had the harpy crying on his shoulder more than once though those times did not bring him happy memories. Gingerly he lifted his arm, and with all his will power and the strength of every quark and molecule in the universe, he patted her back. He probably shouldn't have as her towel took that very slight prodding on his part to fall.

Now, Piccolo had very little interest in human female anatomy, but what he did know was this: the timing was shit.

He froze up when he heard the door open and a familiar energy made his antennae stand on end.

_No._

If he could have run, he would have, but he was petrified. And Dolly made it near impossible to move anyway. He just stared wide eyed at the passageway and waited to meet his demise.

"Dolly, I'm back with the food," a voice called from the hall. "Dolly? Where are…" Gohan poked his head into the living room and as soon as he did it looked like his eyes were going to pop out of his skull. Piccolo opened his mouth to explain, but in a suddenness that made the Namek jump he screamed, "I'm so sorry!" and made a made dash to the door.

"Kid, it's not what it looks like!" Piccolo hollered after him, arms out in desperation. "Don't leave me here!"

After Piccolo had managed to coax Gohan back in the door and explain away the whole damned situation, the half saiyan and Dolly took to happily eating their takeout food while Piccolo sat in the corner and tried to rid himself of his trauma. When that didn't work, he decided to shoot glares of hate towards the happy pair. Gohan pretended he didn't notice.

Dolly still didn't change into actual clothes.

The half saiyan decided soon after that if there was anywhere that was good for calming ones nerves it was going round and round on the city bus—one of the few places where flying couldn't suffice apparently. Piccolo didn't believe him for jack, but seeing as how Vegeta had gone and disappeared he figured the best payback would be to disappear as well.

Even his irritability didn't stop him from thinking about how very little he liked his confrontations with the woman thus far. How very little indeed.

"While she was drunk," Piccolo mumbled while he stared out the window at the constantly changing but decidedly dull scenery of the city, "she mentioned that she's 'impotent'. Is there any truth to that?"

"She told you?" Gohan said in surprise. "She's sterile, yeah."

"She can't have children?"

Gohan shook his head. "Not of her own."

"Oh," Piccolo said. And added beneath his breath, "Thank goodness."

"That's mean, Piccolo," Gohan sighed. Caught. "She was really crushed when she found out. Even if she didn't have a family, she always wanted to have a kid."

"Hnn…" the Namek mumbled. "If that's the case, why is she always getting drunk?"

Gohan shrugged with all the sincerity a shrug could have. "I guess it's because she figures it doesn't matter so much anyway." He blinked and then gave Piccolo a once over. Piccolo grimaced. He hated it when people did that. It made him feel as though a limb had regenerated backwards. "Actually," Gohan said, "speaking of kids, where's the egg, Piccolo? Did you leave it at home today?"

The Namek stared down at his old student, the words only just trickling into his psyche. As they began to take form in his mind, he slowly, mutely started to pat himself down while staring off into empty space.

"Piccolo?"

When he was done checking himself over he just sat there limp and did nothing. Gohan waved his hand in front of his face.

"Piccolo…?"

The half-saiyan let out a cry of surprise when Piccolo tore open a hole in the bus roof and took off full speed along the high way sending cars flying every which way in the process.

"Wait! Piccolo!" Gohan yelled behind him. "It'll be alright! Piccolo!"

It was a lie! It was all a lie!

To be honest, he hated it, and he hated himself, and he hated the egg, but there was nothing he could do. The fact was, if anyone was going to destroy the little omelette, it was going to be him. He at least had to be in the room. Next to it. Maybe in front of it. The point was no one was going to kill the egg but him! That was the point!

_Goddamn it! _

The Namek zoomed up the dorm steps, making people scream and skirts billow, and finally threw open the door of Dolly's room and dashed in side fast enough that the pictures on the wall didn't stand a chance. When he saw the woman sitting beside the egg, he filthy hands poking it and prodding it like a common circus freak he knew she was the on to blame for all this. Who else could it possibly be?

"Thief!" he screamed and yanked the egg away from her as fast as he could.

All she could muster was a diabolical, "Eh?"

"Is it alright?!" Piccolo screamed over her crazy talk. "If you scratched it, I will annihilate you, you miserable drunkard!"

"Oh, Namek," Vegeta said idly as he walked into the room from the kitchen. "It's you."

"Where in the name of Dende were you?!" Piccolo yelled while he held the egg close to his body for safety.

"Getting coffee. But these strange human women were very annoying. They kept asking me if 'they were real'." He flexed his arms and smirked. "What do they think they are? Toys?

"That would be my first guess."

Vegeta went straight for the egg.

"Guys! Guys! Stop it!" Gohan screamed, suddenly materializing between the hissing and spitting of the two men. "Dolly, we're really sorry about this. We'll get out of your hair."

"It's no problem!" she said at the same time Vegeta managed to get his hands around Piccolo's throat. She was not deterred by Gohan hastily pulling the saiyan off of him. "It was fun having company! Your two friends are welcome over any time. Oh, by the way, here, Gohan." She said, and reached under a couch cushion. She pulled out a wad of zeni so big you could sleep on it. "Here's the ten grand I owe you for all my bails. Thanks for coming to my rescue."

Piccolo grumbled while he rubbed his neck and checked his egg for scratches, "How often do you go to jail?"

"Haven't been convicted yet. Anyway, I'll see you later, Gohan. And you too, Piccolo. "Yes," he said. "It was…bearable talking to you."

"Thanks. You too. Oh! That reminds me. Did you guys hear about the carnival that's coming next week? It'll be in the next town and it'll be held as an extension of the amusement park there, but it might be fun to go. I was going to go alone, but the more the merrier, right?"

"Good idea, Dolly!" Gohan said. "We can bond, right guys?"

"Not doing any fucking bonding," Vegeta snarled, his eyes trained on the namekian.

"Agreed."

"It'll be fun!" the half-saiyan insisted. "I can bring Goten and you can bring Trunks, Vegeta. It'll be great, I'm telling you."

Piccolo sighed in defeat. To call it defeat would be a joke. He'd lost before he'd even started fighting. Safe in his arm, the egg stirred.

"A carnival, huh?"

* * *

How weird. November is apparently my month. I was even able to do an outline (a very long section of dialogue with cues for speakers and actions) in the same night. Very bizarre. Perhaps because there's a three hour exam I'm not studying for? Must be it.

As for the person who got hit by Vegeta's rock, don't worry. He didn't die, he just got concussed. Also, Dolly doesn't squeal. She says 'squeal'. She's a strange woman.

Anyway, thanks for continued support of this random fic. This chapter, funnily, was probably only here so I could write the next one without starting it like I did chapter two. Still, I hope you got a laugh out of it. Also, my computer was being a total bastard while writing this, blue screening and such in the middle of paragraphs, so if there are any non sequiturs that don't seem intentional, please tell me.

Once again, thank you!


	5. Chapter 5

Why was it he was ever in proximity to The Woman he wondered what in the name of Dende he'd been thinking? From the second Gohan had dragged him and the idiot to her door, while he was struggling not to kill the two brats and The Woman as they bounced happily about the inside of the bus, to the moment they were standing in front of the Mouth of Hell, he regretted ever agreeing to this debauchery.

"Piccolo, stop brooding, would you?" said Gohan, who had a restraining death-grip on his shoulder and was grinning like a true sociopath. Perhaps Cell was not dead. Not entirely. "I **told you** this would be **fun**."

"You're right, Gohan," Piccolo said, trying to keep Gohan's fingers from going straight through his shoulder and somehow getting into his trachea. "Being threatened by you is the very epitome of fun."

"Why is everyone being so tense today?" Dolly said cheerily, adjusting the edge of her sunhat. "The sun is shining, the birds are singing—"

"The humans are scurrying," said Vegeta with a sneer. He held his son by his wrist even as the boy tried to squirm away to divert himself from the carnival opening and down the road to the arcade he and Goten had nearly gone rabid seeing during the bus ride down to this hell hole.

Goten seemed pretty dead set on taking off himself, and seemed only restrained by the need to provide moral support for his friend.

"Alright, brats," said Vegeta, ignoring Piccolo trying to sign an escape pattern to him.

Rat bastard. "Go run around and stay out of my business." He let go of Trunks and pushed him forward with the tip of his toe. "If the human authorities catch you, neither of you belongs to me. Especially not you, annoying looks-like-Kakarrot boy."

"My name's Goten, Mr. Vege—"

"Shut up," Vegeta snapped.

"Dad, I'm a teenager, remember?" Trunks groaned, though only when his attempt at taking off had been foiled by his father's admittedly fast reflexes. "Why would I want to go to a dumb carnival?"

Vegeta paused, considering the observation mildly, then got onto his knee in front of the boy and for a second Piccolo was under the impression he might miraculously impart some great wisdom on his child--

"Here's your mother's wallet and capsule car," he said, taking the two items from his pocket and handing them to Trunks. "Don't cause any trouble."

--dumb idea.

"Awesome!" Trunks and Goten cried at the same time and were merging with the crowds into the carnival in a second.

More innocents, lost.

"You won't be among them," Piccolo promised the egg. The egg had no noticeable reaction to this. Piccolo realized he was completely insane for assuming otherwise.

"Wow, it's been ages since I came to the carnival," Gohan observed, gentling his grip on Piccolo slightly. "Remember that time you took me when I was a teenager?"

"No."

"Huh. I guess it's for the best." He smiled. "Everyone kept redirecting us to the freak show and you decided to go home."

Vegeta snickered a little and Piccolo grimaced.

"I see."

"I don't think you're a freak, Piccolo," Dolly assured him helpfully. "I think you're very handsome. Though the antennae freak me out a little."

"There's a lot about green bean that could freak you out," Vegeta grinned.

"Funny, Vegeta," said Piccolo, carefully prying his old students fingers away from him. "And how are the gravity room repairs going? Coming along alright?"

"I knew you had something to do with—"

"Guys, let's just enjoy ourselves, okay," said Dolly, touching both Piccolo and Vegeta on their respective arms. "It'll be fun. What'll we go on first?"

"The carnival _is_ attached to the amusement park," said Gohan. "Let's start there and work backwards."

"Good idea! Come on, you guys!" the woman proclaimed and then skipped off into the crowd. Begrudgingly, the Saiyan and Namekian followed under Gohan's watchful eye and walked straight into the heart of madness.

Naturally, they started on the scary rides. Piccolo found himself less than impressed with both Gohan and Dolly, who found _themselves_ shrieking at the top of their lungs right in the Namekian's very sensitive ears on everything short of the merry-go-round. One would think a person who could fly, fight all sorts of villains from across the galaxy, and just be absurdly powerful in general would have a little bit more of a spine. Apparently Piccolo concentrated too much on making sure Gohan wasn't weak, and not enough on making sure he wasn't human. But the way he and Dolly laughed hysterically after they got off every ride seemed to indicate he enjoyed the pointlessness of it all. Needless to say, Piccolo was much more worried about the egg to care about the gravity he'd long lost any sort of respect for. Going on that absurd dropping ride that made his antennae slap his face whenever it decided to stop looked as though it could very easily squish someone's brain inside their skulls if they so deserved it, and he didn't know what it would do to the egg. Not to mention that ride that just…spun. Vegeta making an absurdly inappropriate joke about scrambled eggs had also led him to be a little more cautious, once he'd finished his attempt at trying to rearrange the Saiyan's limbs.

Memories of the day Gohan had told him about when they'd gone to the carnival together in his youth came flooding back as people politely tried to redirect him to, could you believe it, the freak show. Which had been apparently nonexistent in that particular carnival for a decade. If you were going to be insensitive, you could least exercise have a brain cell while doing so. But at least he managed to learn in a lesson in self restraint when finally a small child tried to pay him to do a dance, and Gohan whisked him away mere seconds before the evil little bastard child was incinerated by a chi blast.

He finally managed to understand the world's fascination with amusement parks when they all went on a roller coaster, and once they'd gotten off, Vegeta's hair had been forced firmly backwards behind his head, giving the lovely impression of someone who'd fallen from a wind tunnel and hit their head on a pavement.

Which unavoidably led to the exchange of, "Nice hair, Vegeta."

And, "Shut up."

When they'd finally left the surprisingly unamusing amusement park, Dolly dragged them to a petting zoo at the carnival's peripherals. When the goats very happily started to try and nibble away at Piccolo's _skin_, he realized that he did not like them.

And that they deserved to die.

Dolly's anguished shrieks when he'd grabbed one by the horns and lifted his hand to cremate it had caused him to hesitate, but Vegeta laughing his heart out in Piccolo's peripherals had told him that perhaps this wasn't such a good idea, whether because of morality or spite. When he let the goat return to eating him, Gohan gave him a jovial pat on the back.

"Good to know which side you're on," muttered Piccolo.

"Just don't step on any rabbits, okay?" Gohan blinked and turned around just as he finished his sentence when there was a scream in the background. Piccolo had long become desensitized to honest cries of terror, except during the moments when they were right next to him. Like now.

"Oh my God!" Gohan cried. "That woman's going to fall!"

Piccolo turned, and lo and behold, the ferris wheel had stopped, and some idiot woman was hanging out on one of the bars suspending the wheel. It must have taken some kind of malevolent God to take her out of the car, stop the ferris wheel, and place her there of all places. This did not surprise him. It was natures way that when there were a large amount of strange beings concentrated in small areas, bad things happened around them. He had grown to accept this, and so had yet to contemplate moving. At least this time it wasn't some intergalactic villain bent on the destruction of the galaxy. The police could handle this one. For once they could, you know, do their jobs without having their own bullets ricochet into their brains.

"This place no longer amuses me," said Vegeta once the goat had decided mortal flesh was no longer tasty and wondered off to eat a carrot.

"Perhaps we should go to this 'house of horrors'," the Namekian smirked. "You'd fit right in, Vegeta."

"Hardy har ha—go to hell."

"Guys!" yelled the demi-saiyan. "Come on! We have to do something!"

"I'm getting something to eat," said Vegeta. "Where are those brats with the wallet?"

"Let the authorities take care of it, Gohan," Piccolo said with a malcontent sigh. "Isn't that their job?"

Of course the demi-saiyan didn't believe a word, and somehow managed to drag all three of them towards the ferris wheel with only two arms. The skill was of a dubious origin.

"Just stand under her and make sure if she drops someone's there to catch her, okay!?" Gohan yelled and took off in the direction of the bathrooms. "I'll be right back!"

"But Gohan, wait—wait! Listen to—" He groaned when he was easily ignored by the boy he'd looked after since he'd been three feet tall. Perhaps it was foolish to raise someone and expect any sort of obedience. Perhaps parents of any sort were just terribly naïve. He looked up when Gohan's chi started to approach once more. "Ah, Gohan, you're back. As you can see, she's still perfectly alrigh—,"

He stopped to gape at the travesty before him when Gohan came trouncing back in an outfit he'd hoped had disappeared off the face of the earth for the rest of eternity. It had not. And Gohan, with a grin and one arm raised above his head, proclaimed with all his might, "The great Saiyaman has arrive—"

Piccolo refused to let him finish. Within half a second, he tackled the demi-saiyan to the ground and began to strangle him with reckless abandon, the egg watching the spectacle unconcernedly by his side.

"What are you wearing!?" he yelled, finally getting into the spirit of things. Dear Dende, he had half a mind to smash in Gohan's visor with him still wearing it. "I thought you'd grown out of this. Change. Change right now! Are you listening to me?!" Gohan began to noticeably change colour, if that was any consolation. "How dare you embarrass yourself like this in my presence! Unbelievable…!"

"But-but Piccolo," Gohan managed to pry the Namekian's fingers somewhat away from his larynx, "this outfit is a symbol of truth, justice, and colour coordination! I have to save her in this or else what's the point of being a Saiyan anyway?!"

Piccolo's aura burst into flames.

"Alright! Alright! I'll change! Jeeze…." He groaned and pulled himself onto his feet, before shamefully running back from where he came, with a forced grin and a painfully pathetic wave. "The great Saiyaman departs! Goodbye dear citizens! Have a nice day!"

"Where the hell are you going!?" screamed one of the people standing beneath the ferris wheel just as Gohan begin to fly away, at which point a shoe was summarily thrown at the saiyaman.

"Dear Dende," Piccolo sighed. "I'll save this bloody woman on my own. I suppose I don't have any—," he looked up, and actually found himself surprised that this day was getting worse. "Dolly!?" he cried when he saw the woman pulling herself up the ferris wheel. "Where do you think you're—wait! I'm going to save the damned woman already! I…." He put his head in his hands in distress. He hated everyone.

"Ma'am!" Dolly said loudly once she'd gotten to the hanging woman's level. "Please, take my hand! We'll get down, alright? You just have to come with me!"

"No!" the woman bawled, tears streaming down her face. If she was so miserable up there, one would think she would have had the good sense to stay in her damned gondola. "If I move, I'll fall and--,"

Piccolo took that moment to fly up and levitate before them, trying to indicate that he was back up. Naturally, it was not taken as such. The woman let out a wild shriek and threw herself into Dolly's arms, screaming, "Save me! Save me!" and over again until she was blue in the face. All Piccolo could manage was to roll his eyes at the whole thing.

"Wait, ma'am, please stop kicking!" Dolly pleaded, and had Piccolo not been mulling over the idea of silencing the gratingly loud woman they were trying to save, he might have noticed that Dolly's hand was slipping. "It's alright! We—gah!"

He snatched reflexively at the air as Dolly plummeted, but as he said before, he'd lost respect for gravity and had underestimated the magnitude of it getting pissed off. By the time he realized he'd missed her, she was milliseconds from hitting the ground, and he could only bring himself to stare.

"Dolly!" He yelled.

"Dolly!" Gohan shouted from within the crowd, "I'm coming to--,"

And then Dolly and her ward landed, right into the arms of an impressively uncooperative Vegeta, who had only just returned from buying popcorn that was now strewn across the floor beside its empty box.

"My popcorn," was all he could say. It was always nice to reaffirm precisely which organ the Saiyan brain was located in.

"You saved me, Vegeta!" Dolly said with a grin while the woman she'd 'saved' was curled sniveling against her. One would thing she'd at least been on the falling ride before and would get over herself.

And after a moment of being deeply stunned, the crowd started to cheer and Piccolo landed beside Gohan within it, barely managing a sigh of relief.

To all the stimuli focused on him at once, Vegeta looked at Dolly and merely said, "You owe me a box of popcorn, woman."

* * *

"Well, at least it was a happy ending," yawned Gohan on the bus ride away from the carnival, the orange light of the setting sun getting caught in the bristles of his hair. Vegeta was sitting on the opposite side of the bus, staring out the window and still grumbling about all the food he was never able to eat, and the Dolly was in the back with the boys. Gohan smiled and glanced over at the two demi-saiyan children where they were sitting on either side of the woman, both of their heads managing to fit in her lap only because Trunks had laid his on top of Goten's, and was apparently finding it very comfortable. "Even Goten and Trunks are worn out. Look at them—they look like little kids again, huh?" He paused, staring at the boys, then murmured beneath his breath, "weird…"

"What?" said Piccolo.

Gohan blinked himself out of his reverie and turned his head to smile at the Namekian. There was a strange nostalgic glint in his eyes that made Piccolo glance away in self-preservation. "In a little while your kid will be like that too, Piccolo."

The Namekian's lip twitched and he kept his eyes averted. Painfully so, his arms tightened around the egg, making his next words seem almost paradoxical in nature.

"I already told you, Gohan." He said, "I'm not keeping it."

The old student seemed to have given up on being indignant or upset in regards to the issue. It was for the best that he'd learnt not to waste his breath. He only said in feeble tones, "Why not? You're the only one who can do this." He put his hand on Piccolo's shoulder, forcing the Namekian to look up, if only to give him a sharp glare that told him now was not the time. Gohan took the warning graciously, but continued undeterred. "He won't fit anywhere else."

Piccolo smirked at that.

"True," he agreed, spite dripping from his voice. "It should be with monsters of its own kind."

Gohan twitched faintly.

"Come on, Piccolo. You know it's not like that."

Their was a weight in Gohan's voice Piccolo hadn't been expecting, and for a moment that leaden quality made him reevaluate everything just because he couldn't fathom what else he was supposed to do. That was, beyond being indulgent in one more little thing nestled between a million other 'little things'.

"I could give it to Dende," he breathed, and his eyes stayed focused on the passing city. "And you could visit it whenever you like. It won't be shipped off to some place far away." He allowed himself a small smile. "I just don't want to be responsible for another child. It's much too stressful."

Gohan snorted. "I know what you mean. But, look. If Dolly can take care of Goten and Trunks then you can take care of him." The demi-saiyan grinned. "Besides, if he takes anything after you, you know he'll be a real party animal."

Piccolo indulged in a snicker, if only because it was true. "I'll think about it. I'll decide after it hatches."

"Talking about the bean sprout, huh?" Vegeta said out of nowhere. "I've been thinking—,"

"Have you, now?" Piccolo cut in. "Congratulations."

"I've been thinking," Vegeta reasserted with an angry snarl, "and I figured you should give it a name. You've done all this other nonsense for it. Why not do something useful?"

The Namekian managed to be surprised that Vegeta actually bothered that much about the egg, but not enough to give the saiyan a break.

"You should have quit while you were ahead," he said. "I'm not impressed anymore."

"Vegeta's right," said Gohan. "A name would be great. Then you would really have to think twice before giving him up."

"Hey, I have an idea," Dolly piped in.

"You're a murderer," said Vegeta, managing to be both terribly hypocritical and unbelievably petty at the exact same time. "You don't get to talk."

"Well, Piccolo's named Piccolo, right?" she said, laying her hands out in front of him as though that made the statement less redundant.

"Yes," said the Namekian. "Yes, I believe Piccolo _is_ named Piccolo. Odd coincidence, isn't it?"

"And what was your father named, Pic?"

Piccolo's lips pursed into a hard, thin line. Vegeta narrowed his eye in silent confusion and next to him Gohan bit his lip.

"Um, Dolly, we don't really," Gohan cleared his throat, "talk about him."

The woman blinked, then she lowered her eyes in understanding. "Oh. I see. Well, do you have any brothers and sisters?"

Piccolo nodded. It wasn't an easy topic, but it was certainly easier than dealing with the memory of his father. "I used to."

"What were their names?"

"Piano, Cymbal, Tambourine, and Drum."

"I knew it!" She slapped her hands together proudly. "Then you'll have to name the kid after an instrument too, right? To keep on the tradition."

"I have no interest in carrying on my family's legacy to my so—" He caught himself just in time, and cleared his throat as though something terrible had gotten caught inside it. "To the…child. It doesn't need that hanging over its head."

"It doesn't mean anything, Piccolo," Gohan assured. "It'll just be…poetic, is all. Come on. Give it a shot."

Piccolo stared at all of them as they stared right back, then he closed his eyes and leaned his head against the seat, just as the egg shivered in his grip.

"I'll think about it."

…………………………………………………

Forgive me. This…this was not my favourite chapter to write, and looking over it I don't like it much. But I don't know what else to do with it so yeah. God, this is what happens when you write at one o clock in the morning with Jimmy Neutron playing in the background.

I think this is becoming like one of those manga where there's a new adventure every week but no actual driving plot. [place badly thought out analogy here] I think I may also be sticking in more serious bits from this point on. Mushy, serious, who can tell the difference these days? Again, there will still be comedy. This is a bloody comedy. But I personally like little bits of sobriety placed here and there, like there was in the last chapter as well as this one.

Needless to say, I was so sick of having this chapter lying about in my computer I didn't bother to edit it. So…that's on the table now. I'm sorry.

Thank you to all the reviewers, watchers, and favouriters, and just the general populace who stop by and leave a cookie! All of you rock verily, and I hope my chapters continue to live up to your expectations. If you have any for this strange and random little fic. Thank you!


	6. Chapter 6

It was just going to be one of those days.

Piccolo had an annoying little 'Gohan-sense' that went off whenever the demi-saiyan was in the slightest of troubles. It had been one of those peculiar open secrets for a long time, and to be honest, he'd never done anything to discourage it. On more than one occasion he'd stupidly blown up a tiny section of city (hardly worth the flack he got for it) because Gohan was panicking about something as trivial as, say, not having the perfect word count on an essay, or saying the wrong thing to a friend from class. More often than not, however, the fact that Piccolo had this stupid sense had kept the boy from getting squashed flat into the dirt of some planet off in the middle of god-knew-where.

And that was fine. He could live with people being even more wary of him than they already were, he could live with being told never to enter the city unsupervised again. But he couldn't live—and it was a pathetic, stupid thing to say—without Gohan.

And here it was again, urging him to go to the boy's aid.

"This better not be you one day," he snarled at the egg, which was bundled up in his lap as per usual. It shivered in turn—it had been doing that a lot lately, whenever he spoke to it in fact. He bundled it up in a sling that he tied around his shoulder and, though he knew he was physically ready for anything that might come his way, he levitated there and prepared himself emotionally for the lesser half of an hour. When his Gohan-sense became even more incessant, he looked at the sky. "No rest for the wicked," he muttered.

And it was true too.

The Kais no doubt kept the many grand bastards of the world on their toes.

Speaking of which, he hadn't heard from the royal-pain-in-the-ass for a little while either. Which would have been lovely, if it didn't have an awful, foreboding feeling to it. As though someone was…plotting.

He was not surprised when the sense drew him into the city, and was relieved for it. He was not in the mood to exit the thermosphere today, nor was he in the mood to be laughed off the planet when he arrived, cape billowing, body silhouetted by the sun, dust clearing from the explosion, with an egg slung over his shoulder. He was not emotionally stable enough to take that right now.

He narrowed his eyes, becoming increasingly uncomfortable when he realized he was heading in the direction of Capsule Corp. That had trouble written all over it for all sorts of reasons.

"Please, let it be past there," he breathed as he drew ever closer to the Briefs' residence, hoping against hope that wherever he was going was in the same direction as the corporation, but that was all. He prayed and prayed and prayed, but in the end, it was hopeless, and he stopped before the massive white building with his shoulders slumped. Oh Lord. This was going to be the end.

He looked at the shut door, and decided against a dramatic entrance this time. That door had suffered enough. He went carefully to the side of the building, feeling for Gohan's chi, and then it abruptly spiked. That didn't usually happen. He decided to nix the lackadaisical walk and fly around the rest of the building. It turned out the back door was hanging wide open, and he took no time to ponder his good fortune. He merely took advantage of it.

"Gohan," he hissed when his old student's chi spiked further. What was going on? They were in the middle of Capsule Corp. for heaven's sake. What could possibly have been there to distress him?

"No!" He finally heard the demi-saiyan yell at the top of his lungs from a closed door just to his right. "Stop it, I-"

"You're nothing!" Vegeta spat in turn, his voice a gravelly, angry mess. "You have no choice, boy! None!"

"I can't! I can't…!"

Piccolo loved subtlety, he was all about it. But sometimes nothing quite said 'get the hell off of him' like a ki blast in one's general direction. There was a shriek of dismay from within the cloud of smoke that was still billowing off the fallen door, and an unsettling snapping sound that would probably have to be dealt with later. Piccolo stepped in, hand still raised to take care of whoever was putting his old student in distress, and then stopped dead.

He hadn't been expecting this.

It was a bit of an understatement, true enough, but it was a fact.

In the usual circumstance, he would have assumed the worst and beat the daylights right out of Vegeta's ever-loving head. But not this time. He supposed it was that expression he got from Gohan, wide-eyed and guilt-laden, whilst he was standing in the doorway, but whatever it was, it made his brain crash. Seeing Gohan, pinned beneath Vegeta on the floor, wearing a half-undone suit would do that to a person.

They all stayed in absolute silence for a time, searching for excuses and things to say, but really there was nothing. Piccolo turned away, grimacing with chagrin and disgust.

"…I didn't mean to intrude…"

"It's not what it looks like!" Gohan yelled, forcing the prince off of him with a violent punch to the stomach and scrambling to his feet.

These words made Piccolo pause-he felt as though he'd experienced this whole sequence of events before—but he decided it was merely the sheer level of bile rising up into his throat beginning to leak upwards and start melting the contents of his skull.

"Gohan, go back to what you were doing," he said weakly, suddenly exhausted. "I'm going home."

"No, you don't understand. Let me explain!"

Piccolo turned around slowly. Gohan was standing right behind him, holding his fists at his side, and Vegeta was on the floor, body curled up in pain. Gohan was strong enough to crush the saiyan prince if he so desired, and had probably broken something by accident. The namekian looked quietly at the demi-saiyan's expression, the sheer, crimson-cheeked mortification there, and against his better judgment, was amused.

"You're blushing."

"I'm blushing."

"You're _blushing."_

"I know I'm blushing!" Gohan cried, covering his face with his hands. "Don't look at me!"

Piccolo sighed. Gohan would never change. However, he was now quite a bit more curious about the situation at hand.

"Well?" he said, holding out his palms. "You said this isn't what it looks like." He cocked his head to the side, raising the ridge of his brow. "So what it is exactly, Gohan?"

Piccolo rolled his eyes when instead of looking up from his palms the tips of Gohan's ears went crimson. He needed to get out of this place while he was still sane, lest all this idiocy began to rub off on him, as it had Gohan. Which was a terrible shame, since Gohan was (usually) not an idiotic boy, but today he didn't have the patience to ponder the human inclination to be stupid.

"Stupid Green Bean," Vegeta coughed, making the two others turn to him. Piccolo couldn't help but smile when he found even Gohan hadn't bothered to check if he hadn't accidently killed the prince. It was probably just instinct at this point, though. Vegeta was nearly as prone to dying as Goku was.

"Why don't you mind your own business?" the saiyan grumbled as he pulled himself onto his feet, apparently trying to pretend he hadn't just gotten the stuffing knocked out of him by a man half his age. Needless to say, he wasn't very good at it. "Can't you tell when you're interrupting something?"

"Forgive me for interrupting you molesting my student."

"I wasn't!" Vegeta shrieked, and it was his turn for his face to turn beet red in a mix of anger and embarrassment. Seeing him made Piccolo contemplate what it would be like if his blood was red instead of purple—he imagined blushing would make him look something like a traffic light.

"Stop poking your nose in things, Namekian! I'll crush you!"

"Like Gohan just crushed you?"

Gohan stepped in front of Piccolo just as Vegeta made a wild lunge for Piccolo's neck, hands in front of him and moments from persuading the saiyan prince to relax. When Vegeta rammed into his chest, he let out a cry, and before Piccolo could tell the two of them to knock it off, the demi-saiyan snatched his cape and sent him crashing face first into the floor. Not five seconds later, his nose was gushing blood. Needless to say, Piccolo was not impressed.

"Oh god, Piccolo, I'm so sorry!" Gohan shrieked as Vegeta laughed his heart out. "Let me get you a bandaid!"

"Don' touch me," Piccolo grunted, bringing his arm up as blood still poured rather liberally out of his face. He looked at the egg to make sure that it too wasn't leaking any dubious fluids, and when he was satisfied, he decided to set the proverbial glare beam on the two saiyans, focusing most of the energy on the one that was currently rolling about on the floor in such a fit that Piccolo hoped he was stroking.

"Shuddup," he told the so-called prince while he pulled off his cape so he could use it like a tissue.

"You should have—you should have seen-" Piccolo wrinkled his nose at Vegeta when he let out another peal of laughter. "Who knew Namekians were so spectacularly poised?"

"Vegeta!" someone shrieked from the level above them, shocking the saiyan out of his mirth. "Quiet down, would you! I only said you could help Gohan if you promised you wouldn't try anything on him!"

"Shut up, woman, that never happened!" Vegeta roared towards the ceiling, every inch of him turning such a spectacular shade of scarlet that you could see it through his shirt.

Piccolo smiled faintly. He loved listening to Bulma talk. It was like a radio tabloid that only featured Vegeta. And it was fabulous.

"Maybe we should all calm down," Gohan suggested with a deep sigh. Piccolo had only been there for a few minutes, and it seemed that all the excitement that had brought was already enough to exhaust the young demi-saiyan.

"Agreed," said Piccolo. He removed his cape from his face to find the noseblood had thankfully stopped, and wiped away any excess purple from his features before setting his turban on the floor with his cape, just because he couldn't very well put one back on without the other without looking like he had some very special needs. He crossed his legs and put his hands on his ankles, gazing at the two before him quizzically.

"So?" he asked finally. "What precisely is going on?"

The saiyan prince and the demisaiyan exchanged glances, and when the former just shrugged unhelpfully Gohan found that he had to do the explaining on his own.

"Actually, I was going to tell you soon but…" said Gohan, only for Piccolo to roll his eyes.

"I find that bit of information irrelevant. Please, surprise me with something useful."

The demi-saiyan gave Piccolo a nervous glance from beneath his eyelashes.

"Well, okay, so," he set his hands in front of him, as though announcing to the world it was time to explain, "the thing is…there was this thing, right? And then, you know, _Bulma_ was…and then mom found out and…this, this skillet just, it hit me and…I dunno, I guess she thought that was why we, I mean, Videl and me, you know…and I do visit you a lot, but it wasn't _my_ fault, because I'm a good boy, and I would _never_…but Goten and Trunks didn't say anything so we were all, like, 'cool,'…but, you know, _kids_, right? And then there was this bowtie, just, just strangling me and…a lot of blood, I guess…." He looked at his feet and nodded. "And then we were here."

Piccolo stared at his ex-student for a time, waiting for the unabridged version of that…_dubious _explanation, but upon receiving none, he gave Gohan his best possible incredulous look.

"Are you quite sure you want to be a teacher when you graduate, Gohan?"

"What?" said the demi-saiyan, both inexplicably surprised and, disconcertingly, relieved. "You didn't understand?"

"I was supposed to _understand_ that?" He shook his head. "You're giving me credit for mental faculties that I don't have."

"If he let a little thing like that stop him, he'd never be able to talk to you," muttered Vegeta, which earned him a sharp look from Piccolo.

"Perhaps you would like to try again, Gohan?"

"Um…" the demisaiyan swallowed, collecting his thoughts, and then with a deep breath of air, he just threw it out on the table for everyone to see. "They found out about the egg."

Piccolo didn't react to this news immediately. He just stared at Gohan perplexedly, blinking at the necessary moments, trying to decipher all the individual words so he could figure out what that sentence meant, only to find he still didn't understand it at all.

"What do you mean?"

"They found out."

"Who's 'they?'"

"Everyone."

"Everyone."

"Er, yeah…"

They fell into silence as Piccolo contemplated this, eyes empty and expression blank.

"Gohan?"

"Yes?"

The earsplitting shriek that Piccolo let loose upon the world gave Gohan the cue to get on his feet and make a wild dash towards the window, crying out desperately as the Namekian grabbed at his heels, making his body slap against the floor as he fell over himself, and then was lifted upside down in the air as Piccolo considered whether or not he wished to keep him alive. Usually he would have felt a little more conflicted about his decision to gut him, but today was special.

"What did you do?" Piccolo roared, making Gohan wrap his arms around his head as he swung wildly back and forth to protect himself from an assault that was sure to make him wish he'd stayed inside that devil-woman's womb.

"It wasn't me, I swear!" the demi-saiyan cried. "It was Goten and Trunks! I promise I had nothing to do with it! I just want—I want to live!"

"Do you know what I'll have to deal with because of you?" Piccolo went on. "Do you know the sort of madness you've thrust upon me! Do you think life is an option here? **You'll wish Cell was still alive by the time I'm done with you!**"

"I'm so sorry!"

"I should rip your spine out your chest cavity, you little-,"

"Alright, that's enough," said Vegeta, apparently deciding not to be useless just long enough to be an active intrusion. "If you're going to kill him, at least do it outside. It'll just smell if you do it here."

"I'll do whatever I damn well please," the Namekian snapped, prompting Vegeta to defy physics by having his hair bristle even more than usual.

"How dare you-,"

"If you want Gohan to leave, then take him from me," Piccolo dared. Gohan yelped when his mentor lifted him so high above his head that his fingertips couldn't even touch the ground anymore. Maybe because all of this nonsense Piccolo's mind was slowly degenerating into a nigh-juvenile state, but even though he was perfectly aware that he'd never done anything so childish, he went through with it anyway if for no other reason than to see the expression on the saiyan's stupid face. "Assuming you can even reach that high."

Just as he'd predicted, Vegeta's face was priceless.

His reaction, on the other hand, was not.

Piccolo dropped Gohan on the floor in a hurry, caring little for the yelp of pain the boy let out as his head cracked against the floor. His eyes stayed riveted on the saiyan in front of him, hands half reaching out and eyeballs all too close to bursting out of his skull. Vegeta held the egg in both hands, arms raised above him, a smirk playing on his nasty little lips.

"You wouldn't," Piccolo said breathlessly, taking a tentative step towards the saiyan. When Vegeta replied by moving further out of the way and weakening his grasp on the egg, the namekian knew he was really barking up the wrong tree.

"Something you want to say, green bean?" the saiyan snarled.

"Vegeta," said Gohan, which only invited a sharp glare from the prince.

"Shut up, boy," Vegeta snapped. He loosened his grip even further, the egg slipping through his meager grasp, and Piccolo let out an incomprehensible squeak.

"If you drop that-"

"You'll do what?"

"I swear, Vegeta."

"Then apologize," the saiyan demanded. "Say you're sorry, you son of a-"

Vegeta let out a roar when Gohan knocked him headlong in the gut and he went toppling backwards, the egg flying out of his grasp. Piccolo lunged into the air, made a grab for it and very nearly missed when a chi blast nicked him on the shoulder and blew away a decent sized chunk in the ceiling. He landed on his back, mouth open in a relieved gasp, and mentally prepared himself for the task of wringing the life right out of the little princeling. But not before he was interrupted by a resounding shriek and the door being kicked open with such force that he almost thought a new enemy had arrived on earth with the intent of challenging them. No such luck.

"Vegeta!" Bulma cried, brandishing a wrench formidably in one hand as she did, hair messy and eyes bloodshot from sleeplessness. Her eyes darted around the room like an animals, utterly unforgiving and ready to devour whoever was dumb enough to move first. Piccolo made the mistake of blinking and her head snapped to him instantly, lips curled in a snarl. "How many times do I have to tell you-" It took her a little while to realize the person she was looking at was not her husband. It took a little while after that to realize that said husband was in the corner, trying to wrestle away a seething half-saiyan with all his Napoleonic might. She blinked a few times at the Namekian, who was trying and failing to avoid her gaze, and then her eyes dropped to the egg. "Is that…?" She glanced around once more, and just like that, as though playing connect the dots, she realized exactly what had just happened. No sooner had she done that did she throw herself at Piccolo with all her insane strength, and he let out a useless hiss as she wrapped her arms around his neck as though she meant to choke him. "You're such a good mother!"

"Why am I the mother?" Piccolo bit out as he shoved her off of him, face flushed with the indignity of it, which was enough to get Gohan and Vegeta to stop trying to kill each other long enough to turn around.

On her knees at the Namekian's side, Bulma put her hands in her lap and blinked. Whether she meant to or not, her eyes flicked to Gohan. She caught herself and looked at the ground, shaking her head embarrassedly, but it wasn't fast enough. The damage had already been done. Both student and teacher realized what she was thinking at identical times, and there were undoubtedly no words in this or any universe for the sounds that were streaming through both their heads and out of their mouths.

"I would never-"

"Piccolo's not-"

"Do I seem like some sort of—"

"My mom would-"

"I'd never hear the end of-"

"I'm such a good boy!" Gohan cried, throwing up his arms and looking rather piteously like he was about to burst into tears. "I wouldn't let Piccolo become a single mom!"

"I know," Bulma laughed, waving her hands in front of her face. "I should have realized that to begin with-"

"That should _not _be the reason you realize Gohan and I aren't…_!_" Piccolo drew in a thick breath between his teeth, gripping the egg as tight as it would allow.

"So then who is the father?" asked Bulma. She recoiled just in time to avoid Piccolo's face knocking straight into hers. Vegeta still managing to snicker despite the fact his mouth was bloody from Gohan's fist just infuriated the namekian all the more.

"I am!"

"So then who-"

"Me! I'm the only who was involved in this process, alright? Me and me alone!"

She blinked a few times more. "Fascinating." She smiled at Piccolo from beneath her eyelashes, which made him deeply dubious about the intentions of her next words. "Well, that makes my job that much easier, doesn't it?"

…...

Ironically, even though I'm the one who's writing this, I happen to dislike this style of fic—it's more suited to a script than a story. And yet….people still keep giving me encouragement to finish. Ours is a strange and marvelous world huh?

Well, whatever, here's this decidedly useless chapter, put forth after a decidedly unproductive number of months. I stopped and started this chapter so often that i don't even know if its internally consistent. And I haven't even gone through this for typos. Because I suck. I'm so sorry T_T. Hopefully something will actually happen in the next chapter. Thanks for putting up with me, everyone.


	7. Chapter 7

A (slightly?) more sober chapter this time, guys. And would you believe it, I really enjoyed writing this one, so to all the people who asked me to hang in there, kanpai! Here's to another one!

….

Looking back, Piccolo didn't know how he'd missed it. Admittedly, with all the turmoil and screaming and nosebleeding and egg-throwing, maybe it was a forgivable thing to overlook. And yet, now that Piccolo stood in the middle of a vast, green field , everyone he'd ever known that wasn't dead looking right at him, he just had to wonder why he hadn't grilled Gohan for anymore answers when he found him under Vegeta in half a suit. The answer he'd gotten had only caused problems, and now that he thought about it, had answered nothing. Yet he'd accepted it like a fool, because maybe he was a fool and truly hadn't known any better.

This, however, was unspeakable.

If he'd ever been asked, he would have said no, he was incapable of any emotion remotely resembling stage fright. If he'd said that then he would have been lying through his teeth because at that moment he kept glancing at his hand and comparing it to the shade of the grass to see if he could strip down to his skin and camouflage himself amongst the blades. He knew he couldn't do the same with the egg, not with its shiny, pale shell, but if he tried really hard he could just roll up into a ball around it and his audience would be none the wiser.

Every few seconds, Gohan would tap him on the shoulder, giving him a bleak, strained smile in a feeble attempt to offer his moral support. This was hearteningly backed up by Vegeta smirking at him and punching him on the shoulder, causing the Namekian to stumble sideways, bright purple with the indignity of it. It was much more difficult to assess what possessed Vegeta to do such an unnescesary thing. Piccolo just assumed it was a symptom of being an asshole, like how death was a symptom of the plague. If he had any luck, the saiyan had picked up both sometime during his useless and annoying little life and would be departing to the next life very soon. But it was just too much to hope for.

His face stung a little from where Chi-Chi had assaulted him no less than fifteen minutes ago. Not in the 'ha ha, was that your leg I just shredded? Well it'll grow back soon anyway so I didn't think it would matter' sort of way but the considerably more earnest, 'oh dear, you mean you need your head to survive? Are you quite sure? I'll think I'll rip it off just to check, if you don't mind, and if it doesn't grow back well at least we've learned something,' sort of way. He'd been a little more than startled when Bulma had dragged him to the impressive yard that spanned behind the Capsule Corp. building and the first thing that had happened was Chi-Chi launching herself at him in a fit of rage, demanding he explain to her why her sweet, innocent Gohan was suddenly a father and how a thing like Piccolo could have possibly seduced such a darling boy—all the while cracking his head against her trusty skillet, as though that somehow made it easier for him to formulate an answer. It was only after thirty seconds of him gushing blood out of his temple that Bulma stepped in and explained the that, 'hey, Namekians sort of have a one-man show thing going on, so don't worry, the green guy over there didn't need to molest your child in order to continue the existence of his weirdo snail race and so there's really no reason to kill him, isn't that just swell?'

Head spinning and thoughts rushing, it took Piccolo a little while to realize how wrong this all was. What was Chi-Chi doing so far out of the mountains? At Capsule Corp. no less, even though she clearly wasn't there for Bulma since the heiress didn't look like she'd seen any decent amount of sunlight for a few days. When he got a good look at the harpy, he realized she was better dressed than usual. Her hair glossy and freshly washed, crimson earrings glittering beneath the strands, and her black dress, while not at all showy, had a sort of elegance to it that he would grudgingly admit to. This, compounded with the fact that Vegeta had been violently trying to shove Gohan into a suit while—now that Piccolo thought about it—wearing one himself, got the namekian to realizing that things were worse than he had feared. Gohan and Vegeta appeared behind him without warning, the younger of the two glancing first at Piccolo's face and then spinning round to his mother.

"Mom, you said you wouldn't do this anymore!"

"I had no choice!" the woman cried, holding her skillet protectively against her chest. "I thought that demon had taken advantage of you, and I-"

"Piccolo would never do such a thing, you know that!" Gohan said, throwing his hands into the air while Vegeta snickered to himself. The demi-saiyan spun around to his once-teacher and looked at him with a face so riddled with guilt that it almost made Piccolo reconsider his decision to murder him. "I know, I know, I know how this looks, but I didn't know about this either and everyone was just telling me stuff all of a sudden and then Bulma asked Vegeta to help me get dressed and said I'd have to call you in a few hours so she could get some sleep and I guess she thought she'd have to drag me down here because I had no idea, none, that this was what it was like so please, please, please, please forgive me, or at the very least-" Piccolo pressed his palm suddenly over Gohan's mouth, causing Chi-Chi to puff up like a porcupine fish, the only thing holding her back being Bulma's restraining hand.

Gohan stayed silent as Piccolo passed by him, in the direction the harpy had attacked him from, passing under trees and over grass, Vegeta and Gohan following quickly on his heels, and then, there he was. Wishing more than anything that his life would finally end. Right. Now. Prefe rably fast. When nothing happened he gurgled in his throat and cursed the heavens. Lord, Dende was such a slacker.

While he stared down, all the people at the bottom of the hill stared up. Yamcha, Puar, Krillin, Tien, Chaotzu, Eighteen, Yajirobe, Roshi, Oolong, Goten and Trunks, and of course, standing before them all was Dolly, grinning up at him in a sparkling green dress and somehow he felt as though this was all her fault.

With little in the ways of warning, she kicked off her heels into the grass on either side of her, sprinted up the hill and made a lunge for his neck, screaming, "Congratulations!"

The pair of them toppled back into the grass, Piccolo only just managing to protect the egg from the idiot's weight, and was ready to scramble out of her way and head for the hills when he was suddenly surrounded by a group of people all smiling at him and saying, 'congratulations,' and there was absolutely nothing he could do but stare at them, utterly dumbfounded, face blazing purple, and try not to seem out of his element.

When he was finally dragged to his feet again, Vegeta took the opportunity to knuckle him in the shoulder again, and then he was drowning in a cascade of questions. How and why and when and when Gohan had finally managed to break through the tight ring all around him and tell everyone to give him a few feet of space, he found the answers pouring out of him as though this was somehow no bog deal. Looking at all these people, he wondered when he'd stopped being scary. When did this sort of thing start being possible for a person—a creature—like him? When did people start giving a crap? The namekian glanced Gohan in his peripherals, saw him standing next to Dolly, the pair grinning like a couple of proud parents. And most of all, when did Piccolo start giving a crap about whether or not others gave a crap?

He found himself surprised by the lengths to which Bulma had gone for this. There were table full of food—which he couldn't eat—music—which he could fully appreciate to close to the source—and a general feeling of amicability—which he refused to succumb to—and gifts, which…which were all for the egg…and he wished he didn't feel grateful for. Bulma, in spite of the fact that she was amongst the stubborn minority who hadn't changed into anything that could be considered decent, looked so pleased with herself the entire time that it actually made her look dignified-; something she shared with her husband, it seemed. Piccolo, while being dragged this way and that across the grass by people he could have sworn used to shake in their boots whenever he so much as breathed in their general direction, couldn't help but wonder what her motives were for arranging all this. He couldn't think of more than a handful of times that they had so much as exchanged words with one another, let alone forged any basis for a friendship. But maybe he was thinking too much about it.

Maybe he just needed to relax.

"So…" said Krillin, edging up to Piccolo from one side. The Namekian would admit, he'd never really understood the man. He always seemed to be the most timid, and yet was the only one who seemed to go out of his way to get on Piccolo's nerves. "…you're a dad now, huh?"

"I suppose," Piccolo muttered. He decided to be slightly tolerant of the man today if for no other reason than that he was trying.

"And that thing about Gohan-"

"**All lies**." Behind him, he heard some people start laughing and he swore to himself that if it was him they found so amusing then there would be hell to pay.

"Yeah, I guessed as much," Kirllin laughed nervously. "I didn't think Gohan was-"

When Piccolo centered a glare at him for what he was starting to imply, the man took a careful step back, giving a ridiculously pathetic smile as he did.

"Well…I wish you all the best, P-Piccolo."

"Indeed," Piccolo muttered, and no sooner than a nanosecond later did Gohan and Trunks nail him in the backs of his knees and Dolly snatched him by his neck. He spent the next half hour trying not to die while the rest of the gathering watched in silent amusement, apparently because they had nothing better to do.

At around sunset, when Capsule Corp.'s lights started to flicker on and everyone used their ki to light paper lanterns hanging off trees around the yard, Piccolo slipped down the bank just to look out on the city and think, which he hadn't been able to do much of recently. He sat down crosslegged in the soft grass and set the egg down in his lap, feeling its warmth through the shell and the blanket he'd gotten from 18 and Krillin and wrapped around it. To think, all of this nonsense had happened because of this stupid, unborn , faceless creature, and after all that, somehow, he was still letting it hang around, as though he enjoyed its silent company.

"Not even out yet and you're already causing me trouble," he mused , running the ends of his nails over the egg's pale shell. He snarted and shook his head, leaning back on his hands and looking back at the sky. "I don't know what I'm going to do with you."

"Talking to it, are you?"

The Namekian stood up abruptly, hauling up the egg as he did, and spun around. He would admit, in addition to the fact the woman had managed to surprise him—a difficult fete, by any stretch—she managed to bewilder him further by talking to him at all. Chi-Chi stood before him, hands on her waist, trusty skillet nowhere to be seen. After a moment of tense silence, Piccolo glanced from side to side to make sure no one saw him doing this, and then decided perhaps it was time to be civil.

"It's better company than most," he said, testing the waters with something he imagined coul qualify as a joke. "It doesn't talk back, you see."

"I see," the woman muttered. If she was going to be irritable then why had she spoken to him in the first place. "Well, that won't be the case for long."

"Yes," said Piccolo. "But it'll be someone else's problem by then."

Out of all the things they'd said to each other in all the years they had dealt with one another's existences, it seemed he'd never insulted her more until that moment.

"What?" She all but shrieked in his incredibly sensitive ear. "What are you think! It's your child—your responsibility! Don't shirk your duties! You can't give it away, you just can't!"

Piccolo stared down at her, and suddenly she went red. He didn't understand why until it came to his attention that, inexplicably, he was smiling at the devil-woman. She pursed her lips and averted her gaze from him, apparently so used to the hostility of their relationship that she wasn't sure how to react when Piccolo actually started to come off as a little bit, maybe, somewhat nice.

"So you're where Gohan gets it from," he murmured gently, chuckling at her perplexed expression and wrapping the egg up tighter in the blanket he'd been given, keeping out the cold. "I was starting to wonder. After all, Goku never did show any particular concern for-" He stopped himself abruptly, realizing he was treading in dangerous territory by suggesting that Chi-Chi's was not the ideal family unit that she no doubt thought it was. When he looked at her, however, she merely stared on in contemplative silence before turning to the horizon and entering a reality where Piccolo's last word had been 'wonder.'

"Well, my son's a smart boy," she said, putting up her chin and puffing out her chest with pride. "And he's absolutely right."

"And why is that?" Piccolo replied, regarding her out of the corner of his eye.

She scowled and turned her head as far as it would possibly go, refusing to give him the luxury of eye-contact. "Well, as much as I _hate _to admit it," and she was sure to emphasize the word 'hate' as far is it would go, "I don't think you'd be a _completely_ useless father."

"And why is that?" said Piccolo admittedly amused by how twisted the woman's expression had become when she dared to turn her head faintly back to him.

"Well, you did take care of my Gohan for quite a while—Goten too. And they don't seem to have picked up any of your…" she waved a dismissive hand at him, "…tendencies."

_You mean the murderous, plundering, i-intend-to-dominate-the-world-and-incinerate-your-family tendencies?_ He wanted to ask, but kept it to himself, deciding he wouldn't test the limits of this reluctant, fragile truce.

"And you're not a complete idiot, either," she continued in a grumble. This was clearly very hard for her. "At the very least, Gohan is far more articulate because of his time with you."

"True enough," Piccolo chuckled, thinking back to the way Goku and Chi-Chi had spoken when he'd first met them, as though they had been born and bred in the boondocks (which was precisely the case.)

"And Gohan trusts you, Lord knows why," she sighed, smoothing out her dress and looking suddenly exhausted, and without looking at Piccolo again she added in a whisper, "and I trust the judgment of my son." Finally, she met his eyes again to reveal that they were blazing. He blinked, startled by the sudden change in her demeanor, but when he attempted to speak she snatched him by his collar and for a brief, surreal moment he forgot the paleness and fragility of the hands that held him, and he forgot that she, as woman, was only human. For a that lone, quick moment, they were equals. "So if you prove my son wrong…" she hissed, arms trembling with emotions he had no means to recognize, "if you let anything happen to your child," she bared her teeth at him and started to quake so hard he thought she might shatter, "then I will personally _never_ forgive you."

He stared at her, eyes flicking about her face, and just like that she was human again. A wind blew by, and he tilted his head back, suddenly as exhausted as she was.

"Well," he muttered, "wouldn't that be a change of pace."

She snarled at him and wasted no time in storming off in the direction of the others. He didn't have to turn around to know that she'd gone straight to Gohan to complain, hearing her yells drifting on the breeze, and then there was crunching in the grass behind him.

"Piccolo," Gohan breathed, standing at his old mentor's side, "sorry about mom, she just-"

"No." The Namekian sighed and shook his head. "As reluctant as I am to admit it, this was my fault. I antagonized her and I should have known better. It was my mistake."

"Maybe but…still." The demi-saiyan pursed his lips and put hands on his waist, staring outwards in silent reverie. "I think maybe I've been putting some pressure on you to do something that you may not want to do and…I don't know, it's your kid and it's none of my business so…"

"So?" Piccolo prompted, smiling faintly for some perverse reason.

"So," the demi-saiyan sighed, "I just wanted you to know that whatever your decision is…well, you're my friend and I support you. Okay?"

Piccolo smiled gently, feeling utterly absurd in doing so.

"You're aware that it's because you say things like that that people think this is your fault."

Gohan let out a lone, soft laugh, shrugging in reply. "I guess."

"My, aren't you surprisingly unrepentant," the Namekian mused, to which Gohan only shrugged again.

"Whatever other people think, what I just said is the truth. And I think…I don't know…I think you should know that, because maybe, somehow, you deserve it. " Gohan sighed and dropped his head into his hands. "Sorry, I sound so stupid."

"Agreed. But thank you, Gohan. I appreciate that you're willing to bring your sexuality into question for my sake."

"No problem, Piccolo." He looked up, smiling sheepishly. "You know, this is going to sound strange, but I think Vegeta supports you too."

"You're right," Piccolo said, "that does sound strange."

"But I mean, think about it. He's a father too, you know? He had to go through this stuff with Trunks, and might have to go through it again some day, so he know what you're going through better than most of us, you know. Why else do you think Bulma threw this thing? Other than the fact that when she and Dolly met it was love at first sight?"

"You think he suggested it?"

"No," the boy scoffed. "I mean, I bet he was complaining about you and Bulma heard him and realized that making a pain of himself is how he shows he gives a crap."

"Hmm…I always thought it was just his way of showing he was an asshole."

"Maybe that too," Gohan laughed. "Nut that's not the point. The point is, no matter what happens, we're here for you. Okay?"

The Namekian gave Gohan a cursory glance and then nodded. "Okay."

There was a slow cracking sound very close to Piccolo and a thick liquid started to drip down over his fingers. At first he hardly noticed it, but then he got an eyeful of Gohan's expression and he thought for sure that whatever had just happened was the most terrifying thing in the world.

"Oh God, Piccolo," Gohan croaked, jaw dropped so low that it just barely hung onto his face. He swallowed dryly and blinked a few times, staring in the vicinity of Piccolo's chest, and then finally he met his gaze.. "I think your water just broke."

…..

{This chapter I find rather interesting in that, remember that friend I mentioned who asked me to write this thing? Well, way back when, she requested that I have the egg hatch in a party with all the cast members hanging about. I told her no, out and out, and since I don't plan chapters (which is probably pretty obvious by npow) I decided the egg would hatch when it hatched. And would you look at that, it hatched in a party with all the cast members hanging about. The subconscious is a funny thing, isn't it?

If there's any editing issues, then I'm sorry—this time I actually wanted to go back and check stuff up but the backlight for my computer is busted and my crappy spare (the one I oft complained about at the start of the story) is in the shop, so I can barely see the screen as I type this and I know I'm not helping my eyesight by trying to strain through this stuff. But as soon as my backlight is repaired, I'll go back and fix stuff.

Anyhow, thanks for all your support everyone! You wouldn't believe how much it's helped me! Until the next chapter then, adieu.


	8. Chapter 8

Just to be frank, though Piccolo was now standing with thick, clear fluid dripping down his hands and staring down at the fissure making its way around the egg in what could only be described as absolute terror, he did not find what was happening right now comparable to child birth. On the other hand, this was most definitely a situation where panicking was completely understandable, acceptable even, and he would have done just that if it wasn't for the fact Gohan was doing such a good job of it and he really didn't want to steal his thunder.

"Oh my god, Piccolo, oh my god, oh my god!" The demi-saiyan all but shouted, face completely white, hands pulling at his own hair. He let out a thin wheezing sound and his eyes threatened to roll back into his skull, but he got himself together enough that he managed to throw Piccolo a look that would no doubt give him nightmares for the rest of his natural laugh. "Wait, no, just relax!" _You're one to talk._ "They showed a video about this in high school. Just—oh, god, what did they do—just lift your legs and breath, okay?" He reached out and snatched one of Piccolo's hands, squeezing painfully hard. "Breathe, Piccolo! Breathe! Breathe!"

"I'm not going into labor, Gohan!" Piccolo shrieked over him, but when he realized his voice was quickly becoming thick, wheezing mess, it occurred that he was hyperventilating. That was all it took for the reality of the situation to come crashing down on him. After all his struggling, his protests, he pointless grappling, he hadn't been able to avoid it at all. After all that effort, it was true wasn't it? What they'd all been saying, all of a sudden it was fact—he was a mother.

"I'm not ready for this," wheezed Gohan, as though he was the one who had thick glop dribbling all down his shirt and a freaking child coming into the damn world. "I need a professional—I need-" His eyes lit up and he spun in the direction of all the others. The Namekian knew what he was thinking before even he did. "-mom. Mo-"

Piccolo put all his strength into the punch he delivered to Gohan's gut, causing the student to buckle over with a loud gasp, startled and blue in the face. It wasn't hardly strong enough a punch, but it'd have to do, what with his remaining energy keeping him from swooning and ending up unconscious through this whole nasty business. He could honestly say it had never occurred to him that there might be a situation where he might not know what to do. He'd been in those situations before, plenty of times, more than he could ever count, but it hadn't mattered because as long as his mind was scrambling for an idea it meant all hope was not lost. But this time he was drawing a blank. This wasn't an external threat, not an enemy threatening his life and the existence of the planet on which he lived, this was his egg, and it was hatching, and soon there'd be a life in his hands that had not existed until that moment, and, and—he didn't know what he was supposed to do with it.

"Gohan, I'm going to the look-out!" said Piccolo in a jumble of breathless words, his entire body shaking as though it was about to fall apart. He didn't know if the demi-saiyan had understood him, didn't wait for a flicker of understanding to flash upon his agonized face, now wasn't the time for waiting. He could hardly focus his chi and his body felt like it would topple to pieces during the flight, but he took off towards the look out, no more than a pale sky-streak to all the people down below. He felt the egg trembling more, felt the shell's cracks get wider and further around and across, and begged it not to come before he'd arrived at his destination. He slammed so hard into the lookout point once he reached it that he practically made a dent in the floor, and his eyes darted frantically around, praying that he hadn't gone all that way in vain.

"Dende!" He called, screeched, whatever one wished to call a sound reminiscent to the dying cry of a hideous bird. "Dende it's-"

"Hatching!" the young Namekian emerged from around a corner and scrambled towards the older man before he snatched him by the pantleg, just as Mr. Popo came out of nowhere and shoved him from behind, and it was enough that Piccolo almost lost his balance and toppled over them both. "Come on, come on!" Dende insisted, and the pair started to force him through the labrynthian passageways within the lookout's palace.

"Dende, this is-"

"Wonderful!"

"Terrifying! I don't think-"

"Here! In here!" The small god pushed open a door with his back and suddenly they were standing in a pale room that only had white, stripped bed and a crib inside it. It was here that Piccolo finally, truly, realized what his vision of hell was. And yet, he found himself snatching blankets and pillows and piling them up frantically in a mound, no doubt looking like a violet-faced madman as he did. He heard Dende squealing delightedly behind him, felt the beam of Mr. Popo on his back, but the older Namekian found himself too preoccupied putting his egg into the most comfortable position he possibly could and then stepped back, hoping against hope for gods knew what. When it was no longer relevant, it occurred to him that he was hoping that they could go about this in peace. That he could watch this happen in a small, quiet setting so that he could figure out what to do next in peace. It was silly really, as no more than thirty seconds later the door crashed wide open, leaving it in a crumpled heap on the floor. Vegeta stood in the doorway, his fists still up as though he was getting ready for a fight, and that alone was enough to make Dende whimper.

"Your husband told me you'd be here!" the saiyan cried, eyes darting around the room until they locked upon the egg like one of the cuckoos Piccolo had so long feared. "Is the beansprout really hatching! Let me see!"

"Vegeta, I don't have the time for this right-"

The saiyan made a jump for it—which practically made Dende faint on the spot-but Piccolo caught him by the hands and pushed him back, grappling him with sheer strength of maternal fibers alone. The floor cracked and shattered while they tried to get the upper hand over one another, and the room was filled with their angry hisses and snarls as it became quickly apparent that neither of them was getting the upper hand over the other. There wasn't even enough time for them to spit words into each other's faces before the room was jam-packed with a dozen people that Piccolo did _not_ want to deal with right now, plus Gohan.

"Would you all get out!" he shrieked when they not only started talking, but shoving him backwards, which was made all the worse by Vegeta looking up at him with a nasty little grin plastered on his stupid face. He saw Bulma grab her husband by the shoulder blades, and for a minute there Piccolo thought she might have the good sense to tell him to stop it. But instead of pulling him off—because, good lord, maybe it wasn't too much to ask that a person who had actually popped out another living creature might possibly understand that now was a stressful, delicate situation—she lent him her strength and started shoving forward too.

"Would you stop it!" Piccolo barked, startling her enough to make her jump backwards while Vegeta cringed and muttered something about Piccolo spitting in his mouth.

"But…" Bulma blinked amongst the rest of the wide-eyed crowd. "But this is-"

"No! Out! Now! I'm warning you all, just-"

There was a crack. At first he didn't know what it could be—his bones, his heart, his sanity—but then he saw a glint of green in Vegeta's pitch black eyes, felt the saiyan's strength give out against him, and he too went dead still. It echoed behind him, finalistic and proud, and when he had the strength he turned around, too surprised to remember what he'd been saying or doing a second before. None of it mattered. Not a bit.

It was miraculous, in a strange sort of way. It wasn't as though Piccolo hadn't been expecting this, or that it happened in a way different than how he'd imagined. It was more the suddenness of it, just the knowledge of it going from being nothing but a figment to being right there in the room. That was the nameless, bizarre magic of it. Just like that, with a murmur and a crack so loud it must have rocked the world, he was there: the child they'd been waiting for.

The boy was sitting quietly in the remains of his shell, looking at the people all around him with big, dark eyes. His antennae were just tiny nubs upon his forehead, his long, pointed ears looked almost too big for him, and his skin was the pale, new green of seedling. Despite his young chubbiness, his sheer 'newness', he already resembled Piccolo in the sharpness of his features and the knowledge in his eyes, yet for all that he looked no bigger than a loaf of bread. If Piccolo ever tried, he could probably balance the boy in one hand with ease. The child looked about his surroundings once, skin still shining with the fluid that had confined him, body trembling faintly from the sudden chill of air. His too-small hands grasped at nothing, then touched his knees, then his shell, then the bed sheets, not letting anything escape him. His eyes met everyone's and stored everything, and then he looked at Piccolo. The elder Namekian's breath hitched in his throat at the intensity of the gaze. The boy's black eyes were seeing for the first time and yet appeared as though they'd already gathered all the secrets in the universe. The child parted his lips for a moment as though he meant to say something, to acknowledge Piccolo not through actions but through words, but he said nothing. He only took his first real, thick breath of this strange new world, and then dropped his chin upon his chest and went to sleep.

Piccolo couldn't speak. How could he possibly when he could hardly even breathe, winded by the weight of thoughts crashing into him. Everyone must have gone limp at roughly the same time because the position of clambering over one another ended with every single one of them in a pile on the floor, completely speechless. On the outskirts of the madness, Dende was smiling and unphazed. He moved across the floor slowly but purposefully, stepping over splayed out arms and legs as he went to the bed. Carefully, he picked up the child in his arms and cleaned his face off with his sleeve. When he was done, he bundled him up in one of the blankets that were laid out on the sheets, and then as though it was a perfectly natural thing to do, he leaned down and put the boy right in Piccolo's empty arms.

"Congratulations."

...

Sorry about the crappily short chapter where practically nothing happened even though you waited so long, but this seemed like a good way to end this one so hopefully the next one will be longer, and I'm sorry about how long this took to update, but i finished this over a week ago but everytime i tried to update i got an error. Anyway, thanks to the wonder that is google, i got away to get out, so yay, you have your miniscule chapter. But hey, the eggs finally hatched! And it only took eight chapters to get there! Pretty cool, eh? Anyway, I'll be naming the kiddo next chapter so fear not for that. If you want to suggest anything, that would be cool too, because right now I'm somewhat timid about my decision. Any suggestions about anything would be totally welcome though since I'm treading into dangerous territory and don't want to alienate anyone with my choices. Well! Anyway, thanks for putting up with me! And thank you for all the reviews, alerts, favorites, and even hits. You guys are saints!


	9. Chapter 9

Whoaaa, new update! Finallyyyy! Sorry guys, I totally have no excuse for the lack of update beyond laziness. But here's one now so yayyy! Also, for all you patient people, I drew a pic, which you can find on my profile—the first of the two links at the bottom. It's not the best picture in the world but I really wanted to do something for you. Forgive me…! Now let's do this! (And hopefully next time I'll have something better to offer you guys.)

* * *

Piccolo stared at the child, and the child stared back, and the entire room stared at them staring at each other because apparently it was just that kind of day. They had been there in the room for the better part of an hour, and after the initial wave of people throwing themselves at him everyone had fallen into a deep, expectant silence.

The Namekian opened his mouth, meaning to say something to the child, but he just had one of those expressions that made you think that any word out of your mouth was just going to make you look like an idiot anyway. And so fine, that was fine, he could live with that, it was perfectly tolerable or maybe kind of a little seriously annoying, but he would persevere because he simply had no choice. The two looked at each other a little while longer, and Piccolo shifted a bit, nervous, and he realized something about the child.

He was small.

Too small.

_Ridiculously _small.

The child was so ludicrously tiny that Piccolo felt as though he could hide him beneath his shirt and the people around him would be non-the-wiser. He was just this fragile little thing, this little ball of green and purple that Piccolo had to take care of now. This was his _child,_ he realized.

He was a _daddy._

Though he'd only held the boy for about ten seconds before he'd gone into shock and passed out on Dende's floor, he still felt his minute weight in his hands, his warmth through the blanket he'd been swathed in. There was really no way for him to say it out loud, but he'd never experience anything quite as…real before. Whatever that meant.

He didn't know how much time passed before he woke up again. The sun was still up, and made the white of his room practically blinding, so he knew it couldn't have been very long. When he sat up—his head was swimming, so he did it carefully—and looked around he was surprised to find he was alone. After weeks of being pounced on, imprisoned, yelled at, stared at, and hugged, the sudden solitude was almost unnerving. He looked at his hands, his arms, but they too were empty. It felt like the first time in forever that they'd been that way, the first time in even longer that he'd genuinely been by himself. Some laughter and a deep cooing noise sounded from somewhere in the lookout and he frowned. He had the awful feeling they were treating him as though he'd actually given birth and left him to camp out in the maternity ward while they coddled that baby to their hearts contents. Bastards.

With a sigh, he pulled himself off the bed on which he'd been placed, the sheet he'd been under falling to the floor. Piccolo left it where it lay, his thoughts preoccupying him too much to care about minor aberrations like unfolded linens. He went to the door of the room and opened it slowly, listening as best he could. The sounds of people talking and making marry and all those things he couldn't concern himself with were just down the hall, not that far away. After a few moments of deliberation in which he weighed his options—stay and stagnate for all eternity, or go and let the mortals ram him in the gut with their congratulations-turned around and looked at the window. It was, admittedly, a little bit on the juvenile side, but it had worked for Gohan all those times he'd snuck away from Chi-Chi to—gasp—go and get stronger, and it was sure as hell about to work for him. And it actually did until he realized he was on the second floor of the look out about half way to the ground, and apparently couldn't wrap his head around his own ability to_ fly,_ so he just let out an embarrassingly girly shriek before he hit the ground.

"When did everything start being so much trouble…?" he groaned as he stared up at the sky. With a sigh, he lifted his hands upwards and materialized his cape and turban above himself, catching them before they fell and knocked him through the chest. Tiredly, he stood and pulled both on, then walked meanderingly to the edge of the lookout point and stared out over the edge of the world, the ends of his feet positioned over air. He felt weightless and leaden all at once, as thought if he walked out into the sky he'd simultaneously fall and rise. He'd felt that way since the moment Dende had put the boy into his arms, as though he actually knew what he was supposed to do with the child. He hadn't really. To be honest, having that fainting spell was a bit of a relief. It had given him a little time to think. But lo, it was never meant to be.

"Don't jump." He turned and scowled when he saw Vegeta walking sneeringly up to him. "Let me push you and then we both get what we want."  
Piccolo shook his head in irritation and in seconds the saiyan was standing at his side, looking at the same things he was. "How'd you know I was out here?"

"I thought I heard a woman being shoved out a window." He snickered when Piccolo looked angrily away. "Now, who else could it have possibly been?"

"I don't know, you?"

"It actually was you, though."

The Namekian grumbled at this irrefutable evidence and for a long time, they didn't say anything more than that. More than a little confused by the saiyan's almost amicable silence, Piccolo put forth the thing that had been bothering him, hoping that would simply sweep it away.

"I'm a father now."

Vegeta sneered, eyebrow raised in bemusement. "And suddenly, all around the world, a million mothers collapsed and wept a million tears."

"Mmm."

The saiyan rolled his eyes at the other man's newfound apathy. "The postpartum depression look doesn't really suit you, you know."

"I can't help it. I'm just so…so unsure."

"You think I knew what to do when my brat came around?"

There was another silence, this one quite a bit longer, and then Piccolo blinked and turned to the shorter man. "…oh, sorry, I thought that was a rhetorical question," he said, earning him a nasty scowl. "No. No I do not, Vegeta. But it's different for you." He snorted. "For you it shows."

"Asshole."

"My point is, I've never not known." He shook his head and sighed. "I've never been in a position of uncertainty. Not like this."

The saiyan tilted his head back in quiet contemplation. The look really didn't suit him, Piccolo noted. He looked better veiled in his usual angry, I-bet-you-can't-guess-what-I'm-compensating-for machismo. This here was a little on the creepy side. After a bit, Vegeta shrugged. "Well, he's here now so you're going to have to do something. What are you going to name him?"

Piccolo blinked. The egg had been nameless for so long, it hadn't even occurred to him that he might have to give it a name. _Him a name_, he corrected himself. He didn't even know where to start. Giving the child a name would really seal it, he supposed. It was be proof, solid and undeniable, that there was one more person in the world. And in some strange way, if Piccolo was the one to name it, then that would be proof that it was his. It was a terrifying thought.

"I don't know yet," he admitted. "I just…I hadn't thought about it." He glanced to his side. "How did—"

"You honestly think I had anything to do with the boy's name?" Vegeta said incredulously. "Really?"

The Namekian nearly smiled. "I did think it was strange to name your child after one of your fetishes," he said. "It was nice of Bulma to do it for you, though. You two make a good couple."

"Yeah…," the saiyan murmured. Piccolo counted all the dubious seconds in which Vegeta admitted things that no one had ever wanted to know about him, and then the saiyan spun on his heel and thrust Piccolo angrily, apparently hoping he could send him flying off the edge. "Shut up! I'll kill you, you bastard!"

"Don't shove me!" the taller man snarled when his foot went momentarily over nothing. "I can step on you, you Napoleonic dwarf!"

"Don't call me names! Think of one for your kid, asshole!"

"It makes no difference." Piccolo put up his hands in frustration and turned away. "Dende can name him whatever he likes. The child is his now."

"You know, your husband will kick your ass if he hears you talking like that."

Piccolo spun around to glare. "Stop calling Gohan my husband."

"Fine. Your 'life partner', then," Vegeta said, waving his hand. "Either way, the kid is half his too, so you'll probably be hearing from his lawyer if you give him up."

"You're disturbingly caught up in this delusion of yours."

"Piccolo!" The both turned around though they really didn't need to, because there was only one person it could possibly be. Gohan grinned as he walked them—just like a Son to do that when no one else was—and though it was the Namekian's first instinct to give him at least an acknowledging nod, his eyes fell to the young demi-saiyan's chest, and focused on the small bundle held against it. "There you are! I was worried when you weren't in your room."

"Gohan…" Piccolo breathed pleadingly, but for one reason or another, Gohan didn't hear him. Instead he kept smiling that absurdly good-natured smile and looked down at the bundle in his arms, pointing gently towards Piccolo as he spoke.

"Look, it's your daddy," he murmured. The child turned around in the boy's arms, and looked right at Piccolo with those big black eyes that looked like they knew too much. Even though it was just a baby, the older Namekian just couldn't bring himself to return that vast, expectant gaze. Gohan, ever innocent, just kept going. It was enough to make Piccolo wish that it really was Gohan's kid and not his own. "He's so tall, isn't he? I bet you'll be just as big one day."

"Where's the rest of the entourage?" asked Vegeta when Gohan stopped right in front of them.

The boy shrugged. "Talking about parent-child photos or something. It's a little too far-out for me, I guess. But, lucky for me, they were so caught up with it they didn't even notice the kidnapping that took place beneath their very noses!"

"It's good to know I taught you something with my exploits," Piccolo muttered, and foolishly looked up when he did. Apparently, the boy took that as some sort of invitation, and with it he held out the baby with a smile, expecting Piccolo to take him. And, hating the idea of disappointing the boy who always thought of him as being something truly great, the Namekian did just that. The baby's lightness hadn't been imaginary. He was truly weightless—or maybe Piccolo was just too strong. The baby's eyes focused on Piccolo instantly, and he looked up, barely blinking, and the elder Namekian was starting to wonder if he'd given birth to some sort of predatory bird. His went bright purple when it occurred to him that he'd thought of this whole thing as giving birth. Even if he wasn't necessarily male, he simply lacked the physiology to be thinking things like that. And what about this whole taking care of a child thing, anyway? He hadn't even been alive all that long, and now he had to deal with this nonsense? This was—this was-! "Ugh!" He cried and threw the child back into Gohan's general direction. "What in the world is this? I'm too young to be a father!"

"Don't throw him at people!" Gohan shrieked as he clambered for the child in horror, while Vegeta—who was well versed in the ways of child-tossing-muttered, "You're actually not _that _young."

"This is insane!" Piccolo said, clutching at his clothes in desperation. "I'm not ready for this! I need more time!"

"Quit it! What are you _thinking?"_ the demi-saiyan snapped while the baby he'd scarcely rescued looked about dazedly in his cradling arms. "You can't do that with a kid! You'll hurt him!"

"I-I know but…I can't-" He stopped dead when Gohan reached out and snatched him by his collar, and with about one ounce of his total power, he held him still in place. It was too easy to forget what Gohan was—what he could be. But it just seemed so unreal that so much raw power could exist in a body that didn't know a thing about evil. Even as the demi-saiyan held Piccolo, one of the most powerful people all of earth, still as though he was made of feathers, he held the baby lightly and carefully, like he was made of glass, and his expression that was full of anger was full of sadness as well. Piccolo almost wanted to smile. What a paradoxical boy.

"I know what you're thinking," said Gohan. "You think you can just pawn him off to someone so you can go back to how everything was before." He narrowed his eyes when Piccolo began to answer, and in reply the Namekian kept his mouth shut. "But I can't believe you would do anything that irresponsible. You brought him here, he's your responsibility. If I really thought you couldn't deal with this, then I wouldn't make you." He bit his lip as disappointment welled up in his pitch black eyes. "But you took care of me, Piccolo." His grip began to loosen, and eventually he let the other man go. "And I came out alright."

"I…" the Namekian tried to think of something vindicating, but in the end he didn't find a thing. Gohan looked at him for a few seconds anyway, waiting, and then his pitch black bristled and he spun away.

"Gohan-"

"You know what?" the boy declared, his back turned to the namekian. He moved the child from his arms to his hands, and to his surprise, when Gohan turned around again, he was smiling. "Let's name him Right here, right now. If he has a name, there's no way you'll be able to get rid of him."

Piccolo chuckled at the boy's almost naïve way of thinking, but nonetheless complied.

"Alright, then. What do you suggest?"

"I think," the demi-saiyan rubbed his forehead against the baby's, and the little antennae twitched while the boy made a soft, tiny sound, "you should name him Vielle."

There was a beat in which the general atmosphere of lookout point dampened considerably. Vegeta and Piccolo exchanged sideways glances, and in those gazes, there was a horrible moment where they were actually on the same wavelength. That obviously meant something had gone horribly, horribly wrong. It was Vegeta who was the first to sigh, turn his head, and communicate the general consensus.

"You've lost your fucking mind."

"What?" Gohan pouted. "I think it's great! It's an instrument, so it makes sense."

"What the hell kind of homosexual instrument is that?"

"It's a normal instrument! With strings! Can't you tell from the sound of the word?"

"Sounds homosexual."

"Stop saying that!"

Piccolo frowned while the two saiyans bickered amongst themselves. How in the world did he admit that he agreed with Vegeta? Though he'd always thought of Gohan as at least a little sensible, the whole Saiyaman business had really called some of his integrity into question. Honestly, if he had even an ounce of taste in him, Piccolo would be genuinely surprised.

"I don't mean to sound…" Piccolo trailed off when he found that this business of putting Gohan down lightly wasn't as easy as he'd thought. "Well, to be honest, you've done a few questionable things in the recent past and…I don't think your sense of taste is really…"

"Don't do it," Vegeta turned to the Namekian. "You know what's going to happen if you do. You're setting your kid up for getting rocks thrown at him by pigeons in the park. That," he added, "or the flamboyantly fabulous life of a gay transvestite."

Gohan wrinkled his nose. "Vegeta, you named your son _Trunks._"

"It wasn't me, damn it!"

"Listen, Piccolo," Gohan sighed, realizing this was an uphill battle that wasn't likely to be won. He turned and smiled a little crookedly, and handed Piccolo back the boy who was his child. "It's up to you what you name him. It's just a suggestion."

Piccolo glanced back at the boy who had been deposited in his arms. After a few quick blinks, the boy opened his mouth, his nubby little canines and his tiny little teeth, and made a small, almost prompting sound. He didn't know what it was about it, but Piccolo felt his insides turn to goo. For this _being_ to evoke that kind of response in him was simply unacceptable—a punishment had to be dealt. "Why not," he smirked. "I suppose the name suits him, in a way."

"Really?"

"Really, really."

Vegeta looked between the beaming Gohan and the slightly smiling Piccolo, put his fist to his mouth, and said between thin coughs, "Whipped." Though Gohan only hit him on the arm, it was still enough to make him gasp and gurgle some nonsense about getting his revenge.

"Well, then Vielle it is," the demi-saiyan said proudly. All three of the men looked to the main house when a commotion began to build inside it. Here was an awful feeling that it had something to do with the newly-dubbed Vielle, and by extension, his father, and that was the more worrying of the two.

"You should probably go, Piccolo," said Gohan, never looking away from the house. "Sounds like they're out for blood."

"Agreed," Piccolo took a step out into the sky and dipped slightly before he rose and levitated in the air. In that split second where it had felt like he was about to fall, he felt Vielle grip onto his shirt as tightly as though little hands would allow. "Tell them I'm going on a journey."

"Will do," Gohan laughed.

"Try not to get the kid killed, green bean," Vegeta put in rather unhelpfully, earning him another punch from the beleaguered demi-saiyan.

"You'll do fine, Piccolo." He looked once at the baby, gave a gentle smile, and waved with the ends of his fingers. "Buh-bye, Vielle," he breathed. "Be good, okay?"

With that, the Namekian turned and took off through the air, moving much too quickly to look back.

... ... ...

When Piccolo landed in the cave that was his home, dark, dank place that it was, and noticed the child looking around with subdued curiosity, he felt suddenly embarrassed by how barren it was. Save for the few little ornamentations that had been placed there for the egg's sake and that alone, the place was completely empty. He'd never seen a reason to live anything more than a Spartan lifestyle, but looking at it now, he figured he should have done just a bit more preparation.

He shook himself and stepped inside. He'd been Vielle's age once (that is, a few hours old) and he never wanted his life to be filled with ridiculous ornamentation and design just to make things look nice and pretty. It's not like he'd had anyone to teach him that sort of nonsense. He'd been taking care of himself from day one—what about this kid was so different? He snorted. Maybe all the humanity he'd been dealing with in recent times had honestly polluted him in more ways than he'd initially believed. He moved slowly across the floor, to the side that had long been preordained as the child's and gestured to the basket laid down beside the wall. Gently, he put Vielle down beside it and made an offhand gesture with the palm of his hand.

"This will be your bed for now," he explained, though he had the feeling he might as well have been talking to the shadows that hung in the back of the cave. "That's where I let you sleep…before." He frowned and looked around when he realized the tour was already over. "It's not much, but…I didn't exactly come here with children in mind." He paused. "Or a family." He added. "Or friends…." He cleared his throat. "Obviously, I lived a very fulfilling life before you came along." He blinked when the child seemed to have lost all visible interest in him and was instead looking just behind him, as though the wall that was the only thing there was of any interest. Piccolo got on his haunches and waved his hand in front of the boy's face, but all he managed to make him do was blink. "Did something happen? You look—"

"Hi!"

The namekian snatched Vielle off the ground and spun around, hand out and building chi in his palm, ready to blast the intruder right into the next dimension. Imagine his surprise, then, when he found himself looking into the wide, black eyes of Son Goku. "Holy Dende!" He cried, scrambling back instinctively. Where had _he_ come from? He hadn't even sensed him enter the cave. "What in the world are you doing here? I thought you were dead!"

"Of course I'm not dead, Piccolo!" the saiyan laughed, as though it was the single most absurd accusation in the world. He put his hands on his waist, wrinkling the dirty fabric of his usual orange gi, and then looked wistfully up at nothing. "I was just off training in the sky…"

Piccolo decided to forego pointing out what a moron the saiyan sounded like to address more pressing matters. "It's been _months, _Goku. We thought you'd tripped and cracked your head on the sidewalk or something. At least write someone next time."

"Well, I'm back now, and I'm A-OK." He blinked, noticing the boy in Piccolo's arms. A strange sense of nostalgia rolled over the man when Goku actually had to stare for a little while before he seemed to register what he was looking at. The smile that came after was disconcerting to say the least. "Who's this?" said the saiyan, taking an abrupt step forward. "Did Namek blow up again and we have a new Dende?" Energy sparked in the air as Goku's excitement grew. "Is there another person stronger than Buu for me to fight!

"Wait, wha-"

"Is he coming to earth next?"

"Goku, what are you—"

"Yes! Hurry!" He was suddenly behind Piccolo and pushing him unceremoniously towards the opening of the cave. "Go to the look out point and gather up the dragon balls! We have to wish he gets here _faster!_"

"Would you please concentrate!" Piccolo snapped, bringing his heel into Goku's shin just hard enough to snap him out of it. He turned around and straightened out his gi as best he could—he wouldn't have been surprised if the idiot had taken a chunk clean out of it. "And don't sound so eager for people's planets to blow up. People actually live there, you know."

"But…" he whimpered, "but if planets don't blow up, then there's no one for me to fight…"

No. Piccolo couldn't do this. That day had already been much too long to go about humoring this sort of idiocy.

"Goku, you realize you have a wife and children who you really should be seeing before you go around greeting old war buddies," he pointed out. "You know, since everyone thought you'd died. Again."

"I know." The saiyan went back to his usual smiling self with such immediacy, if Piccolo though he'd been capable of it, he would have believed Goku had been faking. "That's why I went to see Vegeta first!"

"Is Vegeta your _wife_?"

"No, no," the saiyan laughed, waving his hands. "I don't think so." He furrowed his eyebrows. "…I don't _think_ so…Piccolo-"

"Whatever it is you want to ask, please don't." The boy in Piccolo's arms reached up and tugged at his father's collar. His expression was as calm as one would expect from him by now, but his movements were impatient. Piccolo had no idea what Vielle wanted him to do, but all it did was call Goku's attention back to him.

"Oh, that's _right!_" he exclaimed. "That's why I came here!"

"You'd forgotten that too?"

He grinned and elbowed Piccolo playfully in the ribs, which, whether the man knew it or not, ended up being quite painful. "Vegeta told me I had a grandson and I had to come see."

_I don't like where this is going. _"Grandson?"

"If he's not from Namek, this must be him right?" Goku's smile stretched so wide you'd think he was baring his teeth, observing the child with proudly. "And look at him. He's so cute." He looked at Piccolo and winked. "He has Gohan's eyes."

Vegeta, that son of a bitch.

"This is not Gohan's son!" Piccolo shrieked, sending echoes back and forth through the cave and all the birds nested around the forest out into the sky. Why did everyone believe that completely baseless lie? What was with these people and coupling up everyone? It's was practically psychosis.

Even still Goku looked momentarily disappointed.

"…so if Vegeta was lying then…" He gasped. "He's Vegeta's son?"

"Have you lost your everloving mind? No, he is not Vegeta's son! No one else was involved in this but me! Me, Goku! He is _my_ son!"

There was a pause in which the words sunk into Goku's brain. "…So he's not my grandson…?"

"Please don't look so depressed in front of the child."

"Well…even if he's not my grandson…" he said, "you were kind of like Gohan's dad way back when, so I guess that makes him kind of like _my _third son!"

Piccolo smirked. "That's a worrying thought."

"As his second father, then, can I hold him?" He smiled sheepishly. "No one ever let's me around little kids these days."

"I can't imagine why."

The namekian looked up at the ceiling, considering his options. At the end of the day, the boy _was_ his. Though he was confident that Goku didn't know a thing about delicacy or any of its synonyms, he was sure Vielle would be fine regardless. It was, in some ways, a risky assumption, but perhaps it was in his best interests to just humor the saiyan so that he wouldn't have to deal with his pestering for the next twenty-four hours.

"Here," he said, holding Vielle out as far as his arms would go. He really regretted how lenient he was being when Goku snatched up the child like a hungry heron might a fish.

"Oh wooow, he's so light!" the saiyan exclaimed, spinning away from Piccolo before he could grab Vielle back. "Hey little guy, I'm your second daddy. And I'm gonna teach you to fly!"

And just like that, Goku threw the boy into the air. Suddenly Piccolo understood why Gohan had been so mortified by him tossing the child like he had. This was likely karma, and my, was it well timed or what. "Don't toss him!" he yelled. "There's a ceiling up there!"

"Don't worry, he'll be fine," said the saiyan, as though he could possibly understand that most people's heads didn't rival the sheer raw hardness of diamonds. "I used to do this with Gohan all the time, and I almost never hit him on the head." He tossed the boy again, this time more gently, and Vielle made a little sound, his utterly blank eyes flashing with something for a moment. When Goku chuckled at it, it occurred to Piccolo that it had been a _laugh._ Brief and tiny, but it had definitely been there. And Goku, that dip, had been the one to coax it out.

Suddenly possessed, the namekian marched up to Goku, and just before the other man could take his stupid game any further, he snatched Vielle out of his hands and took him back. The saiyan looked genuinely surprised and might have asked what the problem was had Piccolo not been glaring at him with such intensity. The Namekian took in a few deep, unsteady breaths, not so much as blinking as he looked on, and then he cried with all his might, "Do you see that? I think it's an all-you-can-eat-buffet! Run by a _bear!_"

"No way! Way out here?" Goku gasped, spinning towards the cave opening.

"That's right, Goku!" said Piccolo, pointing out into the forest. "But oh no! It's moving away!"

As was natural for a saiyan, Goku practically turned blue when he heard that. "The food's leaving me! I have to stop it!"

"Yes, Goku! Go forth. Fly like the wind! For all the men who have never eaten enough. For all men everywhere! Apprehend that table!"

"Wait for me, double-barbeque dinosaur ribs!" the saiyan cried, bounding towards the cave entrance as fast as his legs could possibly carry him. "I'm coming!" And with that, he was gone.

Piccolo and Vielle looked on after him, and the silence that fell around the cave now that they were alone was almost deafening. Still, it was difficult to believe that had actually worked. It had exactly been the better plains he'd concocted, but it had certainly done the-

"That wasn't a very funny joke, you know."

Piccolo's head snapped sideways, and there was Goku less than three inches away, frowning. "Gah! Goku! But…" _There's only one way into the cave! How did you get behind me!_ "you…!"

"I can teleport, remember?"

Piccolo twitched. Could he read minds too?

Whether the answer to that question was yes or no, Goku never answered it. He shook his head and smiled gave Piccolo a thin, wry smile. "No one seems to give me any credit around here these days. Come on, I kinda did save Earth like a million times. I'm not _completely_ dense."

"Only mostly," the namekian muttered.

"Exactly!"

Piccolo dropped his head into his hand and rubbed his temples. Why didn't anyone take him seriously anymore? "I apologize," he murmured. "That was immature of me."

He jolted when Goku hit him on the back-a gesture that was apparently supposed to be of some comfort, but really missed its mark when it threatened to rupture several of Piccolo's internal organs.

"You know, Pic," the saiyan offered, "I think I know what you're worried about."

"Please, Goku, don't push yourself. I'd hate for you have an aneurism for my sake."

That wry smile of Goku's widened and he said as though in recitation, "No matter what happens, there's no way you can possibly let yourself be a worse father than me." He grinned when Piccolo just blinked at him—he'd hit the nail right on the head. "That's what you're thinking, right?"

The namekian looked away. It was something everyone thought—how could you not—but it was just not the sort of thing you wanted to get back to the person which it concerned. For all Goku's faults, he was at his heart a good person. He didn't mean most of what he did, and certainly didn't deserve most of what he got. And it wasn't as though Piccolo had really been great at taking care of Gohan when he was small, he just got a lot more credit for it simply because he'd been there. These days, people always seemed to forget the kidnapping, world-domination bit. "…Goku, I-"

"I think meeting you was the best thing that ever happened to Gohan," Goku interrupted. Piccolo worried that, wherever Goku had been training the last god-knew-how-long, he'd actually picked mind-reading up as a skill. But the saiyan just kept on smiling. "You're really smart, so I bet all you can ever think of are the right decisions. You're reliable, too." He gave Piccolo an encouraging nod. "I think you'll be a great dad."

It was difficult to deny that infectious Son-smile—and in the end, he had no choice but to return it. "You know," he said, "when it comes to this parenting business, Gohan has been chastising me quite a lot. And he's strong, so he's quite good at it." He chuckled. "It's strange—it always used to be the other way around when he was younger."

"Yeah," Goku laughed. "Wives will do that."

Piccolo resisted the urge to slam his own head against the wall.

"Goku?"

"Yeah?"

"…I think we need to have a talk." The namekian frowned when the child tugged at his clothes again, and once more, it was all the indication of needing anything that he gave, proving itself to be completely unhelpful. "Vielle, for heaven's sake, what is it?" he hissed, starting to get irritated by this verbal wall that separated them. "I don't know what you-"

"He's probably tired."

Piccolo's expression must have been quite taken aback, since Goku actually feigned offense for a few seconds before shrugging.

"What?" he said. "Even though I wasn't there all the time, I was around when Gohan was a baby." He winked. "Like I said, give me a little credit." Goku turned to the forest when a bird called out, long and low, towards the sky, calling in the sunset and the dark. "Listen, I'll see you later, Piccolo. I really should go and see my family," he chuckled as he pressed two fingers against his forehead. "I'll bet they miss me by now. Good luck, okay?" The air seemed to fizzled faintly, and Goku's image seemed to shiver faintly before it disappeared entirely, practically leaving a void behind.

Feeling a little dazed, Piccolo glanced down at the boy in his arms. It was a motion he'd done a thousand times back when Vielle was just an egg, but now with a person looking back, it was something just this side of surreal. He looked at the basket on the floor, and figured that it wouldn't hurt to believe Goku just this once.

"I'm not like him, you know," he told Vielle. He went to the basket on the other end of the room and laid Vielle gently down within it. "I'm somber and dull, and I once beat the crap out of a four year old for a year." With sigh, he sat down, crossed his legs, and leaned his back against the wall. "I doubt you'll find anything akin to laughter here." Vielle yawned loudly and rolled onto his side, curling into as tight a ball as his body would allow him. Before Piccolo knew what he was doing, he had taken a blanket that had just been dropped haphazardly on the floor, and as gently as he could, draped it over the child's sleeping form.

"…but I'll do my best."


	10. Chapter 10

I KNOW YOU HATE ME I SUCK SO MUCH I AM SO SORRY T_T

Okay, well, the last chapter I was pretty clearly phoning it in. Seriously, I was just wallowing in my own inability to come up with anything akin to plot and, in an effort to get a chapter out, just shucked whatever I could onto paper. But! After speaking to the friend who started me writing this fic to begin with (and she is quite mad) we came up with a few ideas which I myself quite liked, and I suppose my only hope is that you like them too. Onward then.

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It had been a few days since Veille's fated hatching. The days had been easy and slow—Piccolo had had no more unsuspected visits from unwanted individuals—and strangely enough, he was beginning to realize the child's presence was not completely awful. He didn't cry or whine or make more of a nuisance of himself than expected. No, he did it just right amount. And there was a maturity in the boy's accepting apathy that made him easy to treat as a full grown adult, even though it was quite clear that he wasn't one. But that was alright, because the older Namekian could be adult enough for the both of them.

Day by day, Piccolo could feel himself almost physically growing in his capabilities as a parent. Admittedly, it had mostly been trial and error, but sometimes to make a cake you had to break a few eggs. So far he'd avoided actually breaking anything, but he didn't think he could hold out much hope towards his fortune managing to last. After all, the entire scope of parental knowledge involved carrying an egg around in a sling, and flinging small boys at mountains. Bones were going to be broken. And if sparring sessions with Gohan could serve as any indication, they would probably be his own.

At any rate, one of the most important things that he had learned the last few days was this: children could not be depended on to bathe themselves. They just could not do it. It was just lightyears beyond the very limited capacities of their little brains. Children apparently also did not know how to swim unless you had already taught them. Apparently they couldn't even grasp the science of floating on their own, as when Piccolo had put Vielle down in a nearby lake with the simple intention of leaving him to soak for a while, the child had sunk like a stone and quite nearly gotten eaten by a rock fish before Piccolo rescued him. And for fear of his only child being eaten by some ugly fish, he conceded that perhaps he'd have to be a little more hands-on with his approach.

Washing Vielle was neither fun nor particularly noteworthy, but true enough, it seemed to serve as something akin to a bonding experience. Anytime the water got to any point above Vielle's chin, the boy would dip his head to take a mouthful of water in his cheeks, at which point the elder Namekian would give his swelled face a gentle poke and all the liquid would come dribbling out.

"You shouldn't drink that," Piccolo mumbled after what must have been the seventh time. "You'll get beaver fever."

Vielle looked up quizzically, his cheeks having a comical jiggle to them. Though the child had yet to say anything more coherent than a slight mumble, he seemed to have a capacity to understand language, and Piccolo had the feeling his small admonishments never fell on deaf ears. The many sideways glances and head-tilts he received were beginning to fill up a dictionary on their own, and by now he could understand them just as easily as the spoken word. And just then, Vielle was wondering what beaver fever was.

Piccolo gave Vielle a sober look in an effort to communicate that this was very important information he was instilling into the boy, and then said, "It's a condition you get from drinking the same water as some radioactive beavers that were let out into the forest a few years ago." He nodded. "Because of the creatures' despicable radioactivity, if one is so hapless as to drink the same water as them, one is doomed to turn into a ravenous, radioactive beaver themselves and then keep eating logs until they explode."

Vielle furrowed his brows incredulously.

"It's true. Keep drinking that water and you'll see. You'll mutate into the must hideous hungry beaver in the world. Then I'll have no choice but to give you to some other radioactive beaver family to do radioactive beaver things with. It's a very serious condition. It tears hundreds of families apart every year, which is why you should-"

Vielle squirted the beaver-fever infested contents of his mouth right between Piccolo's eyes. The elder Namekian stared down at him blankly, even as the child let out the small half-sound of his that was usually indicative of a laugh. Eventually he sobered up and looked at his father was expectant delight, to which Piccolo responded with a sneer. Without a hint of fanfare, Piccolo wiped his face, looked at his hand, and then let out the most melodramatic yowl the world had ever known.

"Vielle, what have you done?" He said, staggering back in the water, the back of his hand thrown against his forehead as though to turn off the part of him that outwardly scoffed at such shenanigans. "You've…you've infected me…! I'm going to become a beaver!" He blinked at the boy dazedly, and scooped him up out of the water. "Vielle, did you know that you are quite green—like a sapling. I can feel my instincts taking over…I think…I might have no choice…but to eat you!"

"I'm sorry, am I interrupting something?"

Piccolo dropped Vielle instantaneously, before throwing his arms into the water and quickly fishing the boy back out before he drowned. Even though he would much rather have avoided it, he still raised his head to the bank, and cheeks flaring with embarrassment, regarded the intruder: none other than the royal pain himself, standing in his training cloths and toting a plastic bag beneath his arm.

"Vegeta," Piccolo growled at that sneering face. "What do you want?"

The saiyan blinked in mock pain. "You aren't glad to see me?"

"Don't shortchange yourself that way. You, Vegeta, are my vision of hell."

"Tut tut tut!" Vegeta chimed, which sounded absolutely ridiculous in that absurd man-voice of his. "Now, is that any way to talk to someone who comes bearing gifts?"

"Are you talking about that odious smell you've been exuding for the last ten minutes?" Piccolo said flatly. "In which case, you can keep your gift. In fact, I might even have to give_ you_ something. Namely, a bottle of cologne, because you smell like a caramelized donkey. When was the last time you bathed?"

"I've been training for a week straight—I haven't had time to fret over such ridiculous niceties."

Piccolo wrinkled his nose in disgust. A week without so much as a cold shower. Charming. "You know, one would think a prince might have some concept of personal hygiene. Honestly, did your parents teach you _anything_ besides how to bash open planets with your forehead?"

"I don't see why they would have," Vegeta shrugged, and picked a little bit of dirt out from under his fingernails. "That's the only thing that's of any importance, anyway."

"Indeed." Piccolo picked Vielle up out of the water and slowly began to move to the edge so they could get out and end this stupid conversation. Vegeta looked at him quizzically at first, and when the Namekian began to step out, his expression turned to one of horror.

"Whoa, wait a second, aren't you going to magic yourself a towel or—" Piccolo stepped fully out of the water, and with that, the saiyan prince reeled back on his heels, his eyes on his hands and lips twisted upwards. "Ugh! I think I just saw _my _vision of hell! Give me a second, I think I might have just gone permanently blind."

Piccolo rolled his eyes. "I don't see why you had the urge to take a peek to begin with." He waved his hand absent-mindedly, clothes instantly appearing on both himself and Vielle. When Vegeta took an experimental glance between his finger to make sure all was well, he smirked. "Did you see anything that you liked?"

"No! Save the flirting for your husband, stupid Namek!"

"Stop calling Gohan my husband, you short, smelly man!"

"Hey, squirt," Vegeta looked pointedly at Vielle. The child looked back blankly. "Watch out for this guy. He's a serious deviant—and that's the type of thing that's genetic. If anything happens, call my wife. She'll actually give a crap."

"Please go home to where people dislike your presence slightly less than me."

"Didn't I say I brought something?"

"And didn't I say I don't want your putrid gifts? Go home!"

Vielle glanced away from the two arguing men, then to the plastic bag beneath Vegeta's arm. As though he could tell it was for him, he gestured lightly to it with the back of his hand, and though the motion was barely discernable both men stopped.

"Heh, the squirt can tell a good thing when he sees it, huh?" The saiyan took the bag from beneath his arm and held just beyond the child's reach. He grinned widely as he jiggled it up and down, causing the bits inside to knock against each other. "You want it, kid? Huh? You want it? Do you? Do you? D-"

"Knock it off," Piccolo said with a decisive slap to Vegeta's head. "Just give it to him, would you."

"Stick in the mud." He pulled back the back, and with unnecessary gusto, he pulled it open to reveal—small bits of coloured plastic, which the Namekian could not understand at all. At Piccolo's clear lack of enthusiasm, Vegeta scowled and dropped the bag on the ground in less than subtle irritation. "It's Lego," he snapped while Piccolo set Vielle down beside the bag so he could investigate the matter further. "The woman told me to give them to you. She says they're good for your kid's brain—make him an inventor or something. Honestly, I think she's trying to indoctrinate him."

The pieces hit against each other when the child reached his hands in and began sifting through them. Not that Piccolo was concentrating on he noticed that a number of the pieces

"Are you sure it's alright to give him those? Don't children have a tendency to put things like that down throats and eyeballs and the like?"

"Eyeballs? What kind of child-rearing books have you been reading?"

"You know that's not what I meant!" Piccolo snapped and threw his hands out towards the boy. "He might suffocate on those!"

The saiyan just rolled his eyes. He waved his hand dismissively and said, "Don't worry about it. Trunks used to shove these up his nose all the time and he turned out just fine."

Piccolo thought back for a moment. Trunks, who had been the dominant brain of that idiot Gotenks, Trunks, who had decided it was a good idea to enter the adult portion of the World Tournament, Trunks, who did nothing but bash his head against things and eat himself silly—that Trunks.

"Define 'fine.'"

"Look," Vegeta said with suspicious speed. "He's already playing with them."

Piccolo glanced down, and sure enough, Vielle had already laid out all the pieces on the ground and was slowly building them into something.

"See?" said Vegeta, gesturing to Vielle's creation. "All's well. And look at how orderly everyone is—he's making his Lego boring like his mother."

"As backhanded as that was, I suppose you're right," Piccolo murmured. "He seems to like them...I wonder why he's making them all walk in straight lines?"

"Except for those policemen, there. They're directing them."

"And those walls are quite high, aren't they? Especially with such a solid door."

"And there's those-" Vegeta stopped dead, and both of the stared in tense silence at the lego-world Vielle had put together, just this side of horrified. Neither really wanted to say it, but there was no use in letting it go unsaid. "Are those…" Vegeta squinted his eyes in disbelief. "Are those surveillance towers?"

There was nothing more to say about it than that. Piccolo scooped Vielle up, pulled away the lego citizen he held in one hand like a steel claw and threw it on the ground. "I think I need to go."

"I think that's a good idea."

"Don't give him anymore gifts."

"I've learned my lesson."

And Vegeta didn't say anything more than that as Piccolo took off into the sky and left him behind.

…

"He was doing what now?"

"Surveillance towers!" Piccolo exclaimed to one confused Dende, his hands pushing over his antennae as he paced back and forth across the lookout. "Can you believe it? He's just a child, for goodness sake, how does he know about that sort of thing?"

"Well…" Dende looked over towards where Vielle and Mr. Popo were planting flowers in the garden, his gaze on them light and not even slightly judging. "Maybe it's not so surprising…"

"Not surprising? Not surprising! It's mortifying!" the older Namekian snapped, his disbelief utterly boundless. "This isn't the sort of thing that's supposed to happen in this day and age. It's—it's completely—" He took a break from his panicking when he realized Dende just wasn't indulging his unreasonable fits of panic as much as he was used to, which in his mind did not correlate with good things. "What?" he said. "You're not telling me something. What is it?"

The young Namekian looked up worriedly, as though he was afraid of his answers effect. He pursed his lips and glanced skywards briefly so he could diffuse the paranoid current passing from Piccolo to him.

"Piccolo…maybe…" He cleared his throat briefly. If the boy wasn't god, Piccolo might knocked him on the head for taking so long. "Well, I've only heard stories, but your father passed down his memories to you, didn't he?"

Piccolo narrowed his eyes. "Yes…?"

"So maybe…maybe they-"

He didn't have to say it—Piccolo was already one step ahead, and he had no problem with showing it.

"You think they went to Vielle!" He yowled and snatched Dende by his collar, lifting him a good half foot off the floor. "Are you insane? Do you know what that would _mean!"_

"Calm down, calm down! Look, I'm_ sure_ it's just a phase. You had those memories too and you turned out great, Piccolo."

"Half of the people he deals with were complete megalomaniacs at one time or another!" The Namekian cried and tossed Dende back to the floor so he could better throw up his arms. "We're doomed!"

"Piccolo, you're exaggerating—grossly," said Dende, picking himself up and dusting himself off. "Besides, he's your son! You have to trust him a little more than that. I'm sure he's been lonely up until now. Why don't you try acclimate him to people? Show him that there's a lot to like about them."

"That's impossible."

"What? Why?"

"I'm afraid the boy is quite astute, Dende," he replied. "I think he'll be quick to notice that I'm lying."

"Why are you such a pessimist? Just look, Piccolo." Dende took Piccolo by his wrist and dragged him to the edge of the lookout. He opened his hand and stretched it out towards an expanse of green and blue that rolled on and out for miles before finally colliding on the horizon. It was the kind of sight that, no matter how great and grand you thought you were, was sure to humble you. And when Dende smiled up at him, he had the same bright expanse inside his eyes. "There's a big wide world out there for him to see."


End file.
